Improving The Future
Home Address Australia
We believe that those with lived experience are the most valuable voices in shaping solutions. Their insights and perspectives are essential to creating effective, meaningful approaches to addressing homelessness.
Lived experience means including the unique knowledge and perspectives of those who have personally faced homelessness and related challenges. By bringing these stories into the work of organizations and governments, we can create more effective and compassionate solutions. This approach values personal insights as a powerful tool for better understanding and driving meaningful change, especially in areas such as homelessness, family and domestic violence, out-of-home care, transitioning from prison, and substance use. Together, we can build a community that listens, learns, and acts based on real lived experiences.
About
With the help of our friends, supporters and allies, it is our objective to disarm the systemic challenges that prevent all Australian’s from having somewhere to call home.
Research
You will find information and links to research findings that help inform effective and efficient programs and policies.
Work with Us
We would like to hear what you can offer to help us make the lives of some of the most vulnerable in our communities a little better.
For the majority of people, homelessness is not a choice.
Seeing People
Choices
There are many pathways to homelessness. For the majority of homeless people, it is not a choice. In fact, people’s choices become significantly limited once they are without a secure and safe place to live.
Most Australians find it hard to look at a homeless person. They prefer to stare straight ahead and pretend that the hungry, damaged, and lonely human being in their peripheral vision simply doesn’t exist. Apparently, it’s just easier that way. If refusing to even make eye contact with a homeless person is hardwired into the masses, then talking to them and listening to their stories is out of the question.
‘For much of my life, I was a man of no fixed address — a more palatable way of saying I was homeless. I had lost faith in society and, truthfully, was on what felt like my seventh and final life. Today, I say this as Dr. Gregory P. Smith, OAM: never give up on yourself, and never give up on others. It is never, ever too late.‘
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— Dr. Gregory P. Smith
What Happened To You?
It’s easy for mainstream society to think of ‘the homeless‘ as a subclass, a statistical phenomenon, or an arbitrary category. But in reality, they are thousands of unique individuals, each with their own deeply personal and often harrowing story of how they ended up at the bottom. Most have experienced having a home—but for one reason or another—have fled it, lost it, or been cast out. Whatever road leads to homelessness, it is more often than not riddled with trauma and mental health challenges of various kinds.
When you see a homeless person, the question shouldn’t be, ‘Why are they like that?‘ The real question needs to be, ‘What happened to you?‘ Only then will society begin to shift its thinking from judgment to empathy, and from ‘Not my business!‘ to ‘How can I help?‘
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (2012), a person is considered homeless if their living arrangements are inadequate, if they don’t have secure tenure, or if they lack control over and access to space for social relations. However, by today’s understanding, this limited definition is in need of a serious overhaul to reflect what we now know in 2025.
Events like Signal Flare’s BBQ’s for the Homeless And Others In Need, show that the community are willing to assist when they understand the issues.
Homelessness – it is your business
Too often, we hear people say, ‘The government should do something about the growing number of people experiencing homelessness,‘ or, ‘There are charities and organisations that handle that.‘
At HAA, we believe that addressing homelessness is a shared responsibility. Homelessness begins in the community—and it is within our communities that the solutions must also begin. Every individual, organisation, and institution has a role to play in making homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring
Home Address Australia’s
Strategic Difference
The voice of lived experience is essential to all decision-making.
Home Address Australia is not a crisis response organisation; rather, it exists to inform and support the work of those operating on the front lines of homelessness.
Our approach is:
- Evidence-informed: Grounded in data and research
- Outcome-focused: Action-oriented, inclusive, and driven by lived experience
- Systemic in scope: Committed to achieving lasting change that makes homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring
News & Stories
Posts
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I survived 10 years alone in an Australian rainforest. I didn’t want to be found
Read more: I survived 10 years alone in an Australian rainforest. I didn’t want to be foundDr Gregory Smith, a homeless man for most of his life, gives a brief version of his life to SBS News.
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A Hobart couple buy former student boarding house for older women at risk of homelessness
Read more: A Hobart couple buy former student boarding house for older women at risk of homelessnessA retired couple has purchased a Hobart boarding house to offer it as low-rent accommodation for older women at risk of homelessness. It’s hoped the former university student accommodation will be able to house up to 10 women at a time in private living spaces with communal areas from October.
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A pause to homeless camp demolitions in City of Moreton Bay
Read more: A pause to homeless camp demolitions in City of Moreton BayThe City of Moreton Bay has agreed not to demolish homeless camps for the time being after a Supreme Court challenge in Brisbane. Lawyers for people sleeping rough in a Kallangur bush reserve say the destruction of property would constitute a human rights violation.
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Queensland Council Moves In on Homeless People
Read more: Queensland Council Moves In on Homeless PeopleHomeless residents living in a park north of Brisbane faced eviction when Moreton Bay City rangers provided just one hour to gather their belongings before bulldozing tents and discarding possessions. Local charity founder Beau Haywood emphasized the desperation of the situation, stating that these individuals have “nowhere to go.”