It's not necessarily that easy; the city refused to give me anything as I wasn't "properly homeless". I wasn't allowed to use a forwarding address ("briefadres"

It's not necessarily that easy; the city refused to give me anything as I wasn't "properly homeless". I wasn't allowed to use a forwarding address ("briefadres"). But I also didn't have a fixed address or bank account and people were unwilling to rent to me because of that. It took me a long time to get things sorted; everyone basically just shrugged. Things were actually easier when I moved to the UK a few years ago. If you don't have a registration in The Netherlands you really can't do anything, and if the municipality doesn't want to give you one you're screwed. In the UK at least things are ways around things (which are strictly speaking not necessarily legal, such as forging a utility bill, but needs must...)