What We Do

Tabor Living is on a mission to provide better opportunities for people experiencing homelessness across Birmingham.

Tabor Living operates several accommodation projects in Birmingham that help those experiencing homelessness. Tabor House provides shelter and support to up to eight people at any one time and Tabor Cottage is a three-bedroom house offering ‘next steps’ accommodation for those moving closer to independent living.

Who can stay

Tabor Living prides itself on being an independent organisation that, in partnership with Father Hudson’s Care, is able to provide help to those who need it most.

This includes people with complex needs and/or no recourse to public funds (NRPF), both of whom often fall through the cracks and can feel let down by the limited options available to them. Many organisations have restrictions around who they’re able to help, but Tabor Living’s projects don’t share these same limitations, which means that we can support an often extremely marginalised group of people.

We take guests of any gender identity over the age of 25, and we do allow some pets.

Referrals

We work in partnership with Birmingham City Council and other voluntary organisations such as Let’s Feed Brum, who make referrals to us. In addition to our Street Outreach Worker, Daniel, who engages with rough sleepers across the city centre.

Once a guest is referred to us, they are invited to meet a member of the team at a pre-agreed location, before being personally welcomed to Tabor House. The focus is always on making the experience person-centred, so guests always have the opportunity to see Tabor House beforehand.

Following an initial assessment, guests are then invited to Tabor House where they are shown their own individual pod, which remains their dedicated space throughout the duration of their stay. This, in addition to our communal kitchen and living areas.

Tabor House originally began life as a night shelter but that all changed during the pandemic, and we now operate 24/7. This means that guests can stay at Tabor House throughout the day but may also come and go as needed for any work arrangements. Should a guest be in a position to move into Tabor Cottage, they have the freedom to come and go as they please.

Download referral form

How it works

Once at Tabor House, a review is conducted to better understand the challenges of moving our guests into a more permanent living situation. This might include anything from visa status and identity documents, through to substance misuse and language barriers.

Each guest is supported by our trained staff team and volunteers, helping them to overcome these challenges, both big and small. They also have a Volunteer Mentor, who sees them on a weekly basis, including three months after they leave Tabor House.

We work with partner agencies to host workshops and training in areas such as English language, employability skills, and core life skills such as cooking.

Strength-based mentoring

Across Tabor Living, we are committed to do everything that we can to enable each of our guests to take control of their lives and take steps towards securing independent living accommodation and employment. We provide guests with a hand-up not a hand-out.

Tabor House is the only accommodation project in the city to take a strength-based approach to support. This means that our mentors and volunteers seek to find our guests’ personal skills and passions, and empower them to make positive steps in their lives. Rather than focus on all of the things they think they can’t do as a result of experiencing homelessness.

Both our Volunteer Mentors and Shift Leaders have been trained by national homelessness charity, the Mayday Trust, to use this innovative approach and we’ve since fantastic and positive results since day one.