I personally think staying at the airport - esp Zaventem (sp?) Airport is a poor idea - really a blah blah place where you have to take a shuttle to the airport train station to get anywhere perhaps.

Will he have any time between arriving in Brussels and starting work? Spending any amount of time in a hotel will quickly become prohibitively expensive. If he starts work immediately, he'll have very little time to find a place to live.

On the other hand, NATO staff will be able to give him some ideas. There should be several interns as well as college-aged children of diplomats and DoD personnel who work at NATO during the summer. With luck, they may even need a roommate.

He'll actually have a harder time getting from some of those hotels to NATO than from a hotel in the city.

When is he arriving in Brussels? Is it the 23rd? I'm going away on the 20th for 3 weeks. If he's arriving before then, theoretically he could have my house....if he'd water the plants.........

Lawchick
He is arriving on the 24th and he went ahead and made reservations at a hotel near NATO for 3 nights and in the meantime he is looking for a place before he arrives and hopefully will have some choices to look at when he gets there. Seems the person he will be under at NATO can not recommend anyone to live with, he just told him the area he might want to look at (Schumann Circle). Viajero replied a few days ago about somewhere on the NATO website where you can find roommates and apts. every Thurs?? Lawchick if you want to rent out a room he might be interested!! I think he will be very busy with work during the week, but he hopes to travel to France and Germany on the weekends.

No thanks. I don't want to rent rooms.

I don't know if he speaks French but he can search for rooms on the following site.

http://www.inforjeunes.be/default.asp?url=kots

http://www.bruxelles.irisnet.be/en/c..._limitee.shtml

Here is a link to short term apartment accommodation- but it's more geared towards business travellers.

http://www.traineesinbrussels.be
This one might suit him better

Here is a site for Bed and Breakfast with a family

http://www.bnb-brussels.be/fr/index.html

Char-- There is a US Army Garrison (USAG) in Brussels (about 5-10 minutes drive from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) headquarters) that provides relocation assistance to all U.S. personnel and families assigned to the U.S. Representation to NATO Headquarters. This includes Active Duty service members assigned to the U.S. NATO, Defense and Department of State civilians, and U.S. personnel assigned to the NATO International Military and International Staffs. If your son is assigned to duties related to this mission then he is entitled to assitance by USAG's Relocation Assistance Program (ACS), Phone 011-32-2-717-9729, International toll free 1-800-342-9647, or International collect 484-530-5908. Either way call them and talk to them. Listings of property (cars, rooms, applainces for sale) come out every Thursday typically in every US Dept of State and DoD overseas locations.

If he is working for a NATO contractor, then his contractor ought to be providing lodging assistance.

HINTS:

NATO Personnel Support Officer: Telephone 00.322.707.4657.

Check the English language weekly “The Bulletin” --Brussels’ essential English-language weekly magazine. http://www.thebulletin.be/

Besides vlan.be try http://www.immoweb.be/

Get lodging for a week and then check the NATO notice board outside the cafeteria, and on the internal NATO intranet system. Always plenty postings.

Thanks viajero!!

You are welcome Char-- all the best to you and best wishes for a great experience to your son.

Immoweb does not have rentals for just a few weeks.

They have normal rentals for a few years. However, the website is good to give an indication of what type of accommodation is on offer.

Perhaps it's too many movies and the Friday night wine, but it may not be entirely fanciful to suggest that the NATO security people have already been alerted to your question about 'hostel' accommodation for your son and will be only too pleased to have someone in the organisation suggest something more appropriate...

As a follow-up on my son looking for a place to stay for 7 weeks in Brussels - he has found a place and will move in tomorrow. It is in Schaerbeek, I think on Rue Theodore Roosevelt 49. Anyway I know some of you did not suggest this area and some did so we will see if he likes it. He went and met the other guys he will be rooming with and said the house was very nice. Hopefully not in a bad area and some nightlife close by!!

Thanks for the follow up. Glad that he is settled. All the best to you and family! Happy travels!