Editorial: Homeless after life working

Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett

Much attention has been given to the struggle some first-home buyers face getting their own home amid rising house prices.

However, it appears housing affordability is not only an issue affecting the young.

Homeless Baby Boomers, a hard-hitting report by the Salvation Army's social policy unit, says growing numbers of Kiwis risk becoming homeless in old age because of falling home ownership rates, rising rents and static housing subsidies.

The report says superannuitants in private rentals will jump almost four-fold from 61,000 in 2013 to 237,000 by 2030, as those owning their own homes drop from 73 per cent of the age group to 63 per cent.

Rents have risen 4 per cent a year over the past five years, while the accommodation supplement has not changed since 2007, making it harder for many elderly renters to survive.

It would be easy to assume that people who find themselves in this situation have not adequately saved and prepared for their retirement.

However, housing researchers have found the trend is affecting people who have held down jobs and led conventional lives until an event such as a relationship breakdown, redundancy, injury or a health setback.

Report author Alan Johnson says the accommodation supplement should be reviewed and possibly replaced by the pre-1991 system of subsidising local councils to build pensioner housing.

He recommends letting councils claim income-related rent subsidies which are now paid only to Housing NZ and community providers, "engaging" councils in the regions with the need to cope with an elderly influx from the cities, raising budgets for aged residential care and building more pensioner housing.

Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett says the Government is "focused on increasing the supply of social housing" but may revisit the policy as supply grows.

Hopefully this review does go ahead, and soon.

The thought of people who have worked hard their entire lives ending up homeless because of a major setback later in life is deeply concerning.

It prompts serious questions about the need for a safety net to ensure this does not happen.