For the past two years, Newcastle woman Cynthia has been relentlessly applying for rental properties across New South Wales.
Unable to secure a home, Cynthia and her staffy-cross Storm have been staying at a friend's place.
"It's practically impossible to get housing when you have a dog," she said.
"I've applied for hundreds of places through emails, phone calls, real estate websites, real estate agents, not just in New South Wales but out of the state as well."
Cynthia has been on the crisis and priority housing list for more than two years, after escaping a domestic violence relationship.
Her rescue pet Storm provides her comfort and support, but she feels like she is being discriminated against by real estate agents for having a pet.
"Especially having a staffy, Storm is just automatically classed as an aggressive breed," she said.
Cynthia said she knew many people who had chosen to surrender their dogs to give them a better shot at securing accommodation.
"It's heartbreaking," she said.
"Unfortunately I live in an area where there are a lot of dumped animals. You see the rangers around a lot."
Rise in surrendered pets
Dee Walton, who manages Maitland Animal Management Facility, said she had noticed an increase in pets being surrendered due to the housing crisis.
"Every day, we are taking 10, 20, 30 phone calls for people to surrender their animals," she said.
"And quite often it's not just one pet, it's two or three ... we just don't have capacity to manage that."
Ms Walton has been in the industry for more than a decade and said it was the worst she had ever seen it.
"People are having to move and the moment they declare they've got an animal they're getting overlooked," she said.
"They [real estate agents] don't say it but that's what is happening.
"What we've found is that people are just moving out and leaving their animals behind."
Hunter Tenants Advice and Advocacy Service coordinator Nicole Grgas said many landlords were favouring tenants without animals.
"There's a real squeeze regardless, and so if you do have a pet it makes it that much more difficult to compete," she said.
"The majority of ads that we see for rental properties will say 'no pets'."
Ms Grgas said while tenancy law itself did not prohibit pets, many landlords included 'no pets' clauses in agreements, which her organisation would like to see abolished.
Cost of living also an issue
Ms Walton said cost of living was also a contributing factor.
"We had a lady wanting to surrender two dogs because she couldn't afford to feed them," she said.
"She said she had to choose between feeding her children or her pets."
Ms Walton said many people wanted to adopt an animal but could not get approval to have a pet at their home.
"As soon as we get one dog or a cat adopted, double will come back in," she said.
Ms Walton said it was a problem rescue centres and pounds were experiencing across all of New South Wales.
