Family forced to move to Ipswich after no houses in Townsville available

A Townsville family has been forced to move out of the city after spending months living in caravan parks and searching for rentals.

A TOWNSVILLE family has been forced to move out of the city after spending months living in caravan parks and searching for rentals.

As the shocking rental crisis continues to worsen, new data has revealed more than 15,000 people are at risk of becoming homeless in Townsville.

One of those family’s who fell through the cracks, the Van Os’, will relocate to Ipswich in the coming days, after they failed to find suitable accommodation after months searching.

Merisse Van Os, her husband Justin and disabled son Conway have been living at Townsville caravan parks since August after they were asked to leave their long-term Kirwan rental.

The family had applied for dozens of houses but were continually knocked back.

Mrs Van Os said her brother and sister in law had arrived in Townsville on Thursday to help move them to Ipswich, where the Van Os would move in with them.

“We are going to start a new chapter down there,” she said.

But the family aren’t on their own with the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute finding between 1.5-2m Australians, 15 and above are only one life shock away from homelessness.

In North Queensland, the suburb of Deeragun had the highest number of people at risk of becoming homeless at 1320.

The next highest was Condon-Rasmussen at 1093 people at risk. The lowest was Townsville - south, where there were 96 people at risk.

The data was calculated in two statistical groups, SA2, which narrows it down to suburbs, and SA3, which encompasses greater Townsville.

Lead researcher, postdoctoral research fellow Deborah Batterham from Swinborne University and Launch Housing said a person was considered at-risk of homelessness if they lived in rental housing and were exposed to low-income, vulnerability to discrimination, low social resources and support, needing support to access and maintain a living situation, and are in a tight housing market.

“We can’t reduce homelessness by solely responding to people when they present to homelessness services, instead we have to turn off the tap up stream, as it were, by delivering preventive interventions that are tailored for specific areas,” Dr Batterham said.

“Understanding the population at-risk of homelessness is critical in designing and implementing such interventions.”

The report found that the people at risk of homelessness were more likely to be female, living in a single person or parent household, identify as LGBTQI, and report fair or poor health.

It found that people at risk had lower levels of education and were more likely to report difficulties paying bills and rent on time.

“Some areas with an estimated high rate of homelessness risk have comparatively small populations, meaning that the number of people at-risk, in comparative terms, is small. Nevertheless, because of the higher rate, more people will be living alongside other people who are at-risk,” Dr Batterham said.

“Conversely, many capital city areas have low or moderate rates of homelessness risk.

“However, due to the much larger number of people in these areas, this translates into a much larger number of people at-risk and potentially a more substantial commitment of resources.”

Originally published as Family forced to move to Ipswich after no houses in Townsville available