need a place? ---> Need a place to live?
 

Then you're not alone. In Amsterdam there are 50,000 people on the waiting list for an affordable social house. Many people do not even bother registering for the waiting list because the waiting time is around 10 years. You can assume thus that more than 100,000 Amsterdammers are seeking permanent housing.

The chances of finding an affordable house, both in the short and long term, are for this reason not good. What are the possibilities?
  Buying a house: The favourite solution advocated by the state, but you must be able to afford it. You can assume that houseprices will be 150,000-200,000 euro or more. If you don't have that kind of money then you'll have to borrow it. That means that you have to earn enough and that for the next twenty years your wages will be shackled to mortgage repayments. The vast majority of the 100,000 people seeking permanent housing in Amsterdam have, in any case, no chance of obtaining such a loan. And those that do manage to get such a loan must adjust their entire lifestyle to accommodate the repayment of it. If you can no longer keep up with mortgage repayments, for example because you lose your job, then you will be evicted from your house.
     
  Renting a house: -- a regular rental house
    Unable to buy a house, renting is the obvious remaining alternative. You have a chance to obtain a permanent and affordable rental contract, consistent with Dutch housing law, after you've waited around 10 years on the waiting list.
However, given the plans of the minister of housing, the chance is large that 10 years from now it will not be possible to rent a house in this manner. After all, rent controls and the notion of permanent rental contracts are already under threat.
    ...but in the meantime...
    Even if you think that in 10 years you will have a chance of obtaining an affordable rental house, you still need to live somewhere between now and then. Welcome to the Twilight Zone! Given that there is no regular rental house available, you'll simply have to accept some kind of (perhaps illegal) interim solution to your housing problem until your turn comes.

    ...a temporary rental contract...
    It is said that there are no rules without exceptions. Although Dutch housing law contains extremely strong protections for renters, the leegstandswet (law concerning empty houses) makes it possible to temporarily rent out houses that are due to be demolished or renovated, with much weaker rights for the renters. In other words, you can rent the same house, for the same price, without any right to maintenance of the property, rent protection, or replacement housing once you leave. But, as you've probably already guessed, even for this type of renting there are these days long waiting lists.

    ...subrent....
    People who have found a new house are often not so keen to terminate their old renting contract, because of the acute shortage of houses. If you look for a house via the newspaper or via a housing broker, you often get a house offered where you are not allowed to register with the city council, and where the house must - formally speaking - continue to be rented by the "real" renter. It often happens that the rent is extremely high and that you are asked to make a large downpayment. The sub-letting of a house is, moreover, forbidden. If the real houseowner, often a housing corporation, finds out that the house is being sub-let, you will be evicted from the house.
    ...as anti-squatter...
    If you think that the options described above are the lowest rung of the ladder, you'd be mistaken. The large shortage of housing creates an environment in which some houseowners use their properties purely for speculation. Such properties are worth the most if it can be ensured, at very short-notice, that the property will be empty. As soon as a house has been rented out in the regular renting system, this is simply not possible (because of the rights of the renter.) For such houses it is often not possible for the owner to obtain a permit to rent the house temporarily, because he/she/they have no clear plans for the house.

To prevent that their speculative intentions become too apparent, and that the city council or housing activists subsequently try to stop these practices, owners often arrange to have their houses guarded by anti-squatters. Anti-squatters have absolutely no right to house-peace (the right to, amongst other things, determine who may and may not enter your house) or other standard housing rights. The 'contracts' that anti-squatters make with these speculators often contain absurd rules such as no smoking, no guests, no pets, no holidays, and access rights for the owner at any moment they choose. Of course, an anti-squatter can be required to leave his/her house with pretty much no warning.

Moreover, temporary rent and anti-squat reinforce the position of those people who are responsible in the first place for the housing shortage.

Do you find it difficult to accept the 'solutions' named above?
Do you consider it uneasonable that nobody pays any attention to your fundamental right to secure housing? Are you angry because speculators profit from the housing shortage, and because the government acts as though it is innocent and powerless to do anything?
Go squatting then! - watch the movie
    Given that nobody is going to do anything to remedy the housing crisis (apart from making impressive-sounding, but empty, promises) it's better to undertake steps yourself. The fact that - despite the 100,000 people seeking housing in Amsterdam - houses still stand empty (for whatever reason), means that you can also choose to go and live in such houses without permission from the owner.