Rental crisis: How life changed forever for mum and kids forced into a tent
Lucy, 41, was forced to leave her $350-a-week accomodation, giving her no choice but to sleep in a tent with her two children.
On her first night sleeping in a tent with her two children on a rainy night in February, single mum Lucy remembers it being "really challenging".
"It was pretty hectic," she told Yahoo News Australia. "Because I didn't know how long I was going to be there. It was the middle of the wet season."
The mum of two was forced out of her rental property in Kuranda, north Queensland, where she was paying $350 a week for a roof over her head and a bedroom for her children, Asa, 5, and Alana, 7. But with nowhere else to go amid the housing shortage and rent hikes, she landed at a nearby campsite.
Moving into tent was an act of desperation
Living in a tent certainly wasn't her first choice.
"There was just nothing available, and if there was, there were so many people going for them," she said of her struggle to find a home. "Being a single mum with two kids I found I wasn't high up on the list of people they want to give the property to."
Out of desperation, the 41-year-old pitched a tent at Billabong Campground in Kuranda, a mountain village she moved to with her kids from Cairns a few years earlier — and suddenly became one of many staying in tents without a permanent place to live.
"It was definitely a struggle both mentally and physically," she recalled. "When you're in a house, you've got your kitchen, everything's right there, you've got everything you need.
"We had a camp kitchen that you couldn't store anything in, so I had to carry everything down to the kitchen and carry everything back".
Turning point for struggling mum
Lucy, who works part-time as a yoga teacher, was paying $200 a week for her site, which included power and water. And at times she felt unsafe. The time outdoors put the trio in hospital with a harmful staph infection. "It was pretty full on," she said.
Everything changed in April when the family was given the chance to housesit for a friend in Cairns. Being "enclosed" in four walls without nature made Lucy "feel anxious" making her miss her campsite home. Now she happily chooses to live there instead of in a regular house.
Young family forced to live in tent as Australia's rental crisis explodes
Woman with a job goes from paying $1200 a week to living in Sydney tent
"I realised I didn't really want to live in four walls. I don't want to do that now," she said. Today, the single mum welcomed a new way of life for her children.
Lucy and her kids have now spent six months living on the land, but she doesn't consider herself homeless. They've set up camp on a private property paying $100 a week to her landlord.
"We have power and we have water, but we don't have a shower and toilet yet so we're using a bush dunny," she said. "The kids love it. They go to Steiner, a nature school, so it's what they know. "
Single mum happy and making ends meet
Life in a tent allows the single mum more financial freedom and more time spent with her kids. "We're saving a lot of money being in the campground and meeting lots of people, there's more of a community vibe," she said.
"If I was living in a house I'd probably be paying $500 a week with bills, and I wouldn't be able to afford to spend $150 a week on organic food or have them in the school that I choose to have them."
The father of her children still lives in a house where the kids spend a lot of their time. They watch TV and play with toys but "I'm not about that" Lucy said.
Since sharing her journey on TikTok the mum, who goes by Lucy Aura8, says she's "absolutely" received judgement with critics saying camp life is unfair to her children. But she says her kids are "really resilient and they can live in any way if it's normalised".
"I feel like a lot of people are in fear of living in this way. There's fear of being outside of the system in any way," she said. "[Living this way] frees me up with more choices."
Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com.
You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter and download the Yahoo News app from the App Store or Google Play.
