One key agency dealing with the escalating homelessness crisis in the region is getting clients who have never sought-out such help before.

Rural Housing Network, which services communities right across the North East including Wodonga, said homelessness was a significantly greater issue than the community realised.

“There’s a lot of people who access our services for sustaining their tenancy who have never accessed a service like ours ever in their lives,” Rural Housing client services manager Catherine Jefferies said.

“It’s mainly people who are working where one of the partners may have lost their job.

“They’re under financial pressure and they can’t meet their tenancy.”

Mrs Jefferies reiterated the message of many working in the sector – and that is that rough sleeping was not symptomatic of the problem on the Border.

“To be honest, in Albury-Wodonga we don’t get a huge percentage of rough sleepers,” she said.

“It’s the hidden homeless.

“It’s the people we have living in the car and they’re still trying to maintain a job.

“It’s the people who are sleeping on their aunty’s couch and she’s still trying to get the kids to school.

“That’s what homelessness is about.

“If people stopped and thought ‘if my partner lost their job tomorrow or if I lost my job, what would my life look like?’.

“It would be very different.”

Di Glover, who heads the key Albury agency dealing with homelessness, yes unlimited, said people in such financial stress was becoming a clear trend across the area.

Ms Glover said the only positive from this was that people were coming to yes unlimited’s The Hub in Macauley Street earlier “rather than leaving it until they are literally without somewhere to stay tonight”.

“We still see that as well,” she said.

“But it’s good that people are coming to us much earlier in the process.

“We are able to help them, are able to negotiate a repayment plan or a mortgage repayment plan or downsize to something a bit cheaper.”

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