Homelessness takes different forms
Home more than just a place to lay your head
Many years ago, my family found ourselves in a challenging situation as we experienced homelessness for a short time, and our temporary refuge for a few weeks was a borrowed tent pitched at a camping ground with a 6-month-old baby in tow.
Although it was stressful at times, there was a sense of adventure as we made do with very little. However, the fun side of this holiday lifestyle quickly disappeared when a storm blew into Wellington and heavy rains flooded us out of our makeshift shelter, leaving us with no choice but to seek refuge with distant family members.
It was a trying time, and the feeling of not being in control of my family’s destiny weighed heavily on me. I never wanted to not know where I would be sleeping that night again.
When I lived in London in the 90s, people sleeping rough was something you saw every day on the streets around where you lived.
Coming from New Zealand, homelessness was definitely less common back then, so that was new to me. I worked in A&E at a hospital near Notting Hill and in the winter we had a regular crowd (men mostly with alcohol problems) who somehow always knew when the ‘kind nurses’ were on duty and would flood into the waiting room to sleep the night away.
In the morning, we woke them for a hot cuppa and a piece of toast when we had time and then they hurried off before sister turned up and threw them out.
I’m reminded of those times when I heard women and sometimes men have been sleeping on the veranda of the Heretaunga Women’s Centre building tucked away around the back and out of the way.
Sometimes we find bedding hidden in bushes around the building as people squirrel away their bedding and belongings during the day so they can go find food, showers and other daily ablutions.
Of course these days you don’t have to be sleeping rough to be homeless. Every week women come into the centre asking for advice and help in finding emergency accommodation and their homelessness often looks like sleeping in cars, on couches in friends’ houses, or makeshift accommodation with the kids in a relative’s garage.
Because of a separation and then having to sell my own home, homelessness had been on my mind again as I entered into the rental market for the first time in 20 years to try and find somewhere to live for me and my son.
One of the property managers I talked to was pretty honest and upfront, telling me without a doubt Hawke’s Bay’s rental housing was in crisis. She said single women were doing it hard and this was mostly to do with income disparity: basically, men and couples just earn more and therefore look more attractive to landlords on paper.
Also If you’re newly separated and you have owned a home you will have no rental history and you just don’t tick their boxes.
Saying that MSD will pay the rent she said was no guarantee that they actually would.
Writing a reason why you are homeless, while heartbreaking to read, most landlords just could not afford to be kind. She told me she looks to see that income left after rent is paid is around $300 a week.
In these times that might be what you need to survive on paper, but most women are surviving on much less, feeding children and still making rent. However, that is the criteria landlords and property managers adhere to because they are concerned that one large bill might mean you can’t make that week’s or month’s rent.
I don’t know what the answers to homelessness in our community are. I’m white, I’m educated, I found a place to rent. Lucky me. Women are struggling out there to find a home.
I know home is more than a roof over your head: it’s comfort, security and a place to raise a family, a place to build memories, it offers hope and safety and future dreaming. It’s a place to lay your head at the end of a day when things haven’t gone your way.
Sadly no application form can take those feelings into account.