Dark, hot, and dire: Adelaide’s homeless are resorting to using storage units for ‘shelter’ during the day

As the housing crisis worsens, desperate SA community members who can’t find a home are spending their days in dark, hot storage boxes and walking the city streets at night.

Hayden Patterson at Kennards storage unit facility on Port Rd, Thebarton. Pictured on 7th December 2024. Picture: Ben Clark

Desperate South Australians who can’t find a home are spending their days in dark, hot storage boxes without any electricity and walking the city streets at night.

Hayden Patterson, 49, is one of those people.

Mr Patterson and his eight dogs were evicted from their home in late October and moved in to his car.

After crashing his car, Mr Patterson said he spent his daylight hours in a dark storage room at Kennards Self Storage in Thebarton with no electricity.

However, the facility closes at 6pm when Mr Patterson and his dogs are forced to roam the streets until it reopens at 7am.

He pays $700 a month for two units.

Kennards storage unit facility on Port Rd, Thebarton SA. Pictured on 7th December 2024. Picture: Ben Clark

Mr Patterson said he knew of at least 10 other homeless people who were living at storage sheds across the suburbs over the last few years, with compassionate staff often “turning a blind eye” to their client’s “extended time” in their sheds knowing they had nowhere else to go.

However, Mr Patterson’s stay has come to an abrupt end as he’s been told he cannot stay in the storage units because of the dogs.

A letter from the site manager, seen by the Sunday Mail, says he must no longer attend the property for “extended periods of time”, could not bring his dogs inside the storage units and had seven days to move all his belongings out.

He said he was back living on the streets because he had lost hope that the SA Housing Trust would find him somewhere suitable to live.

“I can’t take much more of this” he said.

Hayden Patterson being forced out of home and moving into his car with his 5 dogs in October this year. Image/Russell Millard Photography

South Australian Council of Social Service chief executive Ross Womersley said the increasing number of people who had money for storage units but were forced to stay in them because of a lack of housing “underlines the desperation and great urgency of our lack of medium term solution food quality affordable accommodation”.

“The units have no electricity, very little movement in the air and can become absolute hot boxes,” Mr Womersley said.

“People who are on the streets though are going into them because they just want some sort of privacy and somewhere where they can feel safe for just a little while.”

Hayden Patterson at Kennards storage unit facility on Port Rd, Thebarton SA. Pictured on 7th December 2024. Picture: Ben Clark

When the Sunday Mail first met a then tired and teary Mr Patterson in late October he said he feared his homelessness would cut his life short.

Along with bipolar 1, he also has epilepsy and is HIV positive.

He said he had been having seizures in the storage unit and had been getting infected sores on his legs that simply were not healing.

On Saturday, those concerns were again amplified as he packed some of his stuff on his cart and headed to some shade at near-by park with his five dogs and three puppies he says are “his only family”.

Kennards Self Storage was contacted for comment.