Homelessness: 'My family has been moved from county to county for two years'

Caroline Kelly had been renting for 13 years until she was forced to leave after her landlord lost his house. 'All our lives got turned upside down when we lost our private accommodation.' Picture: iStock

Caroline Kelly has been living in emergency accommodation in Dublin for two years with her two children, aged 18 and 13.

The 40-year-old was renting in Dublin for 13 years, but her landlord lost his house after falling in to debt. Caroline has been moved around hostels and hotels in Louth, Meath, and Dublin while awaiting a permanent home.

“We have been in emergency accommodation for two years in Dublin, but they paid for us to go to Meath for five months,” she said.

This article is part of the special report on homelessness. Read more here: 

A national shame: Another Christmas for thousands in emergency accommodation;

Case study: Young mother forced to live in a mobile home after 50% rent rise;

Case study: Mother living in B&B with her family on housing list for 19 years.

“The amount of placements we have had is horrible, and you’re meeting all families in similar circumstances.

“You just try and keep your family together, and in the same school, but at one point we were in Drogheda and the kids’ school was in Blanchardstown, and we would have to travel every day for nearly two hours each way, just to get them to their own school — where things are normal. That is the reality of it,” Caroline said.

We have been moved all over — including Donabate, Blanchardstown, Bettystown, Drogheda, and Donore.

“You just keep hoping it will be OK, and I am in and out of the housing units every week asking for a home.”

Christmas is “the worst time for people in temporary accommodation”, she said, but she tries to make it easy on her children.

“I can always say it could be worse; at least we have somewhere out of the cold. But the hostels are jammed now; there is no room to put people. They are all full and they are horrible to live in, most of them.

“I just try my best to keep Christmas easy for the kids, but it really is so horrible, and all our lives got turned upside down when we lost our private accommodation.”

Caroline said her key worker had tried to encourage her to find permanent privately-sourced accommodation.

“I said no, I am not doing that again in case we lose that place too. I ask all the time for somewhere to live, but just keep getting told, ‘we have no accommodation’, so I was going around the place not knowing where we would end up.

“We were settled in a place for 13 years and then, next thing, you are uprooted, and really just not enough is being done for tenants and people who have no homes.”

The homeless situation in Ireland has gone from “bad to worse”, she said, and some of her friends have been living rough for 20 years.

“They can’t get anywhere and, like most of us, you are going from A to B, and never know for sure where you will end up. 

"You can’t settle. You are lost, and it leaves you feeling so depressed and sad. 

"There are so many like me out there who just want their own place and it’s like no matter what is being said about people living like this, nothing changes and we are all like lost souls going around the place.”