“I talk to a lot of older people and many of them are nervous about where they are going to live, and are they going to be able to afford rent when they haven’t got a nest egg or enough in their KiwiSaver account, and they haven’t got a job.
“They also worry whether they might also be in this precarious situation of being homeless.
“At the moment in Whangārei, there are 75 over 65 years old. These are older people living in cars or sleeping rough, but there are a whole lot more that could actually be also at risk of becoming homeless.”
The Te Tai Tokerau Emergency Housing Trust founder said high property prices meant increasing numbers of New Zealanders were renters rather than home owners, but once they retired it could be hard to keep up with rising costs.
Peters believed the problem was repeated around the motu, but Northlanders’ extra challenges included some of the lowest incomes and highest power prices in the country.
She said living rough was hard on anyone, let alone over-65s.
“I’m 77 and with my aches and pains, I wouldn’t survive. I might be able to live in a tent for a weekend, but I’ll probably be quite sore afterwards. And the cold would kill me for sure.”
Maureen, who did not want her full name used, said she became homeless when what she expected to be a long-term housing arrangement fell apart last month.
The 78-year-old ended up living in her caravan just outside Whangārei, but said she was one of the lucky ones.
“Fortunately I had friends who said, ‘well, you can park the caravan at our place and you can use our spare bathroom’, so I had somewhere to live. But it is unsettling to be past my working life – I worked until about two years ago – and have not enough money to rehouse yourself.”
Maureen said her sudden change in circumstances showed her how quickly people could end up homeless.
“I think in that situation it must be very, very frightening and very lonely to be completely on your own and not have any support. I’m not in that situation, but it’s still unsettling. I’m fine for now, I’m well, I’m still active and I’ve got lovely people around me, but that could change. Who knows?”
She had also met enough rough sleepers to know how tough their lives were.
“It’s finding somewhere to shower and being able to cook a decent feed, storing food and things like that in a vehicle, having to lug your stuff from one place to another, I think would be incredibly difficult. I feel like I’m kind of a couple of steps away from that.”
Increasing numbers of people aged 65-plus are homeless due to falling home ownership and rising costs.
Age Concern chief executive Karen Billings-Jensen said no one knew exactly how many older people were sleeping rough around New Zealand, but she suspected the Northland numbers were echoed nationwide.
Housing insecurity often affected older people who were renting but could also affect those who had owned a home all their lives.
That could be because of shocks such as the death of a partner or a family breakdown.
“We know those things happen and really rock someone’s security. We also know there is an increase in people renting so home ownership is dropping around the country,” Billings-Jensen said.
“Forty per cent of older people only have New Zealand superannuation. As fixed costs, like rent, rates, insurance, electricity, continue to go up, they can’t be absorbed within a fixed income. So some people have had to leave tenancies because they just can’t manage the additional costs.”
Billings-Jensen said other factors included a shortage of homes suitable for older people – the proliferation of multi-storey townhouses made sense in terms of increased density, but they could be inaccessible for people with limited mobility – and flip-flopping by successive governments.
She said cross-party agreement was needed to avoid about-turns in housing policy every time a new government was voted in.
Other needs included stronger tenure for older renters and better information about exactly how many over-65s were sleeping rough.
“It’s working out who out there is affected right now. Those living in their tents or cars right now need some action, and we need to ensure any barrier that might exist for them is removed, so they can move into safe, affordable places to live.”
Billings-Jensen said she had “huge concerns” for the safety and health of older people living in cars and in tents.
“They’re not safe, warm places for people to reside in, especially now winter is here. We do encourage people to reach out and seek help from agencies.”
Billings-Jensen said the fix would not be quick or simple, but it was in the interests of all New Zealanders – for example, through reduced stress on health and social systems if fewer older people had to live on the streets.
“It’s a long-term structural challenge. We’re not saying it’s easy to deal with the housing challenges we’ve got, but we need to have that long-term commitment and the ability to gather the right data and make the right plans so that we’re not still talking about this in five years’ time.”
According to the Ministry of Social Development, 2955 people aged 65-plus were on the waiting list for social housing nationwide.
All three of Northland’s district councils had pensioner flats which were means-tested, with asset limits ranging from $20,000 to $40,000 for a single person. Rent was generally around 30% of superannuation.
There were 164 pensioner units in the Whangārei district, 144 in the Far North and 34 in Kaipara.
Iwi, marae and private trusts also operated kaumātua or pensioner flats around Northland.
– RNZ