For over a year now, Tereasa Clements has been living in a caravan at the Hobart Showground.
"I got made redundant in Launceston and moved down here with my partner," she said.
"I was going to get a house, but the price of housing to rent is impossible. So, I'm here, and we're in the van."
Over the past couple of years, the showground has been one of the rare places where people struggling to find housing in the Hobart area have been able to stay long-term — often in tents or caravans.
Living in their van has not been a huge problem for Ms Clements and her partner. He works nearby, and the couple has seen it as preferable to "going into debt to rent".
But with the site about to undergo renovations, they — and the 20 or so other long-term residents — will have to go elsewhere.
"We've got to be out by the 31st, but don't know where to go. We've got nothing lined up," she said.
"It's not through lack of trying, put it that way, it's just becoming impossible."
Hobart bucking rental price trend
According to new data from CoreLogic, the median rent in Hobart is now $552 per week — up 5.3 per cent in 2022.
While rents across the country went up more than 10 per cent in 2022, nationally, growth seems to be tapering off — up 2 per cent in the final quarter of the year, compared with 2.3 per cent in the September quarter.
However, Tasmania seems to be going the other way. Rental values increased 3 per cent in the December quarter, compared to 0.3 per cent the previous quarter.
CoreLogic attributes this to a surge in overseas migration to the state, after a couple of years of COVID-induced border restrictions.
In the year to June 2022, CoreLogic says 2,745 people arrived from overseas. That's significantly higher than the five-year, pre-COVID average of 2,325.
That may, in part, explain why — despite efforts to increase housing stock — the rental vacancy rate in Tasmania remained frozen at 1.1 per cent throughout 2022.
Migrants struggle to rent
The Tasmanian government and other employers have been desperate to attract migrants, especially those who can help address the state's skills shortage.
Vice-chair of the Multicultural Council of Tasmania, Aimen Jafri, told the ABC many migrants have come at the invitation of employers, attracted by the lifestyle and the beautiful scenery.
But when they arrive, they quickly find there's nowhere for them to live.
"[My friend] has four families living with her, and each family has children," Ms Jafri said.
"They have four people in one room, three people in one room, my friend and her daughter in one room. Living like this is very distressing for them."
Ms Jafri said this what not an uncommon situation, especially in Hobart, where the vacancy rate is just 0.6 per cent.
Skilled migrants with established lifestyles in their home country, she, her husband, their two kids and her mother-in-law are now living in a small house on Hobart's eastern shore, after recently being asked to vacate their rental.
"It's taking a toll on my family," she said.
"I'm very happy living in Tasmania, but the challenges that we are facing are very real, and I don't have many reasons to convince my husband to stay here now."
The state's acting housing minister, Madeleine Ogilvie, said alternative accommodation was being looked at for those living at the showgrounds.
"Every Tasmanian deserves a roof over their head and that's why the Salvation Army's Street to Home program has been working consistently with the people temporarily residing at the site to help them find suitable, alternative accommodation through Housing Connect," she said in a statement.
Tenants paying rent up front
Ben Bartl from the Tenants Union of Tasmania (TUT) said some desperate people, faced with long lines at open homes, were offering more than the advertised price on their application form.
"We also hear stories of tenants offering three or six months' rent in advance, even up to one year's rent in advance in order to get the property," he said.
"Some tenants are having to give up pets in order to secure a property and others are signing onto to lease agreements without first viewing the property."
For some, the only alternative is to apply for social housing — the waiting list for which has gone from 58 weeks in November 2021, to 101 weeks last November.
Mr Bartl said those who do find a place to live are desperate to hold onto it, and the tenants union had seen a 29 per cent increase in the number of people asking for their help in the past three years.
"Whereas many would've moved to alternative properties in the past — because rents were too high, or repairs were not being carried out — the dire state of Tasmania's rental market means that many feel that they have no choice but to fight tooth and nail to hold on to their current property or face the risk of homelessness."
