Apply for emergency housing

When you apply, we'll ask you about other housing options you might have, including:

• staying with family or friends
• accommodation options you can afford (including temporary accommodation)
• help if you're behind in your accommodation costs
• help if you need bond or accommodation costs for a new property
• help with moving and travel costs to shift to another suitable place
• negotiating with landlords.

Emergency housing is short-term accommodation. If you qualify for emergency housing, you could stay in places like a boarding house, backpackers, or motel. It depends on your situation and what's available.

How to apply

If you don't have other housing options (listed above), follow the steps below to apply for emergency housing.

Step 1 - Call us

• If you're 65 and over, call 0800 552 002
• If you're under 65, call 0800 559 009
• If you get Youth Payment or Young Parent Payment, call your youth coach. If you don't know how to contact your youth coach, call your Youth Service provider and ask for your youth coach. You can find the contact details for your Youth Service provider on the Youth Services website. If your youth coach isn't available, call us on 0800 559 009

Step 2 - We'll discuss your housing options

We'll talk with you about your situation and what housing options you might have. For example, staying with family or friends.

If we think you qualify for emergency housing, we'll book an appointment for you.

You may need to provide supporting documents. If so, we'll let you know what these are.

Step 3 - At your appointment

We'll confirm whether you qualify for emergency housing.

As part of this discussion, we'll check there are no other housing options available to you.

We'll check if transitional housing is available

This is funded by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). If there's a space in transitional housing, you can stay there for a few months while you find a more permanent home.

If there are no spaces in transitional housing, we'll look at emergency housing options.

We'll look at emergency housing options

We'll try to find somewhere for you to stay. We have a set of standards that emergency housing suppliers need to meet. You can stay with a supplier who has opted in to our standards. If they haven't opted in, you may still be able to stay with them, but only in certain situations.

To find a place, we may contact these places to check if there's anything available. We may ask you to contact some of these places too. We'll try to keep you in the same area but it will depend on what's available.

Ideally, emergency housing will be available on the same day, but there may be a wait. Once a place has been confirmed, you can go there as soon as it's available.

We'll tell you about your rights and responsibilities

You'll have rights and responsibilities while staying in emergency housing. We'll talk to you about these, including:

• a security deposit, if the supplier requires one
• your rights
• what you're expected to do
• if you have concerns or want to make a complaint, and
• your responsibilities from the 8^th night (if you're still in emergency housing after 7 nights) and what will happen if you don’t meet them.

Step 4 - Follow up appointment

Emergency housing is short-term accommodation. We'll approve it for a certain period of time (usually 7 nights). If you still need emergency housing after this time, we'll book another appointment with you.

At this appointment, we'll:

• check if you still qualify for emergency housing
• check there are no other housing options available to you
• confirm you understand and agree to your responsibilities and what activities you need to do to meet them
• check if the accommodation you're staying in still meets your needs, and
• check if you qualify for public housing.

We'll also check we have your correct contact details. This is so we can get in touch with you again when we need to.