Adelaide woman Jennifer Harris has spent eight years in and out of temporary housing, including homeless shelters and living in her car.
She has a medical condition that makes it impossible for her to work full-time, which makes saving difficult.
But after months on a waitlist, she finally moved into public housing a fortnight ago.
While Ms Harris welcomed the state government's $177.5 million commitment to build 400 new public housing units and its $10 million pledge for the state's homelessness services, she said it "wasn't enough".
"It's not going to cover the problems that are already existing," she said.
"I know other countries have looked at it and they've discovered it really costs more to support a homeless person than it does to house them, so let's follow suit and house the homeless."
There is a six-month waitlist for public housing in South Australia and the additional 400 public housing dwellings will take time to build, doing little in the immediate term to relieve growing rental unaffordability and squeezed vacancies across the state.
South Australian Council of Social Service chief executive Ross Womersley said the budget did not go far enough to address the state's "rental affordability crisis."
"We see some big investments in public housing and those are welcome, but they are a small amount of the investment that's required in the long term," he said.
Cost of living pressures to keep growing
While not even the state opposition could deny the Labor government's first budget delivered exactly what the party said it would, Liberal leader David Speirs said the billions of dollars in health spending would have "consequences" for the most vulnerable in the community.
With the budget projecting inflation will rise from 4 to 5 per cent next financial year, Mr Speirs said household budgets would be "under significant pressure."
"A real concern of ours is the lack of initiatives around cost of living," he said.
"But that isn't offset by any particular programs in this budget."
The government has announced it will spend $39 million on doubling cost-of-living concessions for almost 185,000 South Australians, who will receive one-off payments of up to $449 next financial year.
Soaring power prices add to pinch
Soaring electricity prices are another element squeezing South Australian households.
Energy consultant Rachel Brdanovic received $6,000 towards her home battery under the former government's Home Battery Scheme.
"It definitely tipped us into doing it instead of just talking about it," she said.
"But the other thing it did — in a bigger picture — was that it incentivised battery manufacturers to come to South Australia and it made [batteries] a lot more accessible and lot cheaper."
Instead, the government has slashed the former Liberal government's battery program as well as another grid-scale storage fund, declaring the programs were ineffective.
While the government is funnelling $593 million into a hydrogen hub in Whyalla, which it says will eventually drive down wholesale electricity prices, advocates are worried about immediate prices.
Mark Henley from Uniting Communities said lower income households "desperately needed support through PV or batteries for lower-income households".
"We are disappointed that support for low-income households in adjusting to energy costs is not part of this budget," he said.
Opposition Leader Mr Speirs said the Liberal government had "continually" looked for ways to reduce pressure on household budgets.
"Whether that was by reducing the emergency services levy, putting downward pressure on water bills or tackling the cost of electricity," he said.
"We don't see those types of measures here."
