The huge tent city that has emerged amid Australia’s housing crisis

Inside the huge tent city that’s emerged amid Australia’s housing crisis – and many of them are stuck there despite having full-time jobs: ‘A new class of homeless people’

  • The rental crises is hitting one holiday town hard 
  • Tent city has appeared in Moruya on NSW South Coast

A campground filled with tents at an Australian holiday destination isn’t what it first seems – the residents aren’t holidaymakers but locals who can’t find houses to rent.

More than 50 families have moved into the tent city at Moruya, an idyllic beachside town on the NSW South Coast, with the need so high from locals that the holiday park is no longer open to tourists.

The campground usually has a limit to how long people can live there – under two months – but council is now waiving this as they have nowhere else to go.

‘In no way could I ever imagine that a council could kick people out of an area just because it’s a tourist area,’ Eurobodalla Shire Mayor Mathew Hatcher told 9News. 

Cassie, a mother-of-two young boys, worries she could be the next permanent resident of the tent city after her rent became too expensive in July 2022.

More than 50 families are permanently living in the tent city (pictured) in Moruya on the NSW South Coast as the town struggles with an affordable accommodation shortage

Cassie said she wants somewhere that her two young boys can grow up healthy but there isn't available accommodation despite her working

Cassie said she wants somewhere that her two young boys can grow up healthy but there isn’t available accommodation despite her working 

Cassie has been living in crises accommodation and hotels for more than six months – at points having to choose between paying for a temporary roof over their heads or eating.

‘I just want a home for these boys. I just want my boys to grow up happy and healthy and know that they’ve got somewhere to sleep every night,’ she said.

Lachlan Fuzzard from non-profit The Family Place at Moruya said it’s not simply a fact of there not being work in the area.

‘We are seeing a new class of homeless people called working poor who have full-time jobs but just can’t find affordable long term rentals in their area,’ he said.

There are several factors leading to the accommodation crises in the town.

The Black Summer bushfires that ripped through the area in 2019 destroyed 501 homes but just 122 have been replaced, the problem exacerbated by construction material supply issues.

On top of this sea-changers who left the cities during Covid have snapped up many of the free properties in the area.

What’s left is owned by investors who keep them as strictly short-term holiday holidays or temporary worker rentals.

Kelly who lives in a mouldy, mice infested caravan at the tent city said she wants to give her 17-year-old daughter a better life but there is simply no affordable accommodation in the area.

Local charity Anglicare is helping by delivering care packages but Mayor Hatcher said the problem can only be fixed by state politicians taking notice.

He wants to see the issue made a priority before NSW residents head to the polls this weekend.

Cassie said she is worried she will have no choice but to become a permanent resident of the tent city

Cassie said she is worried she will have no choice but to become a permanent resident of the tent city

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