One in every 200 Australians does not have a home to stay in every night. Each night close to 100,000 Australians do not have a place that they can call home. To add to this staggering figure almost half of this group is under the age of 25.

Homelessness can be broken up in to four key levels.

These levels include:

• Sleeping rough: Living or sleeping in the street, in parks, cars or bus shelters.
• Stop gap housing: In temporary housing, crisis refuge accommodation, or moving in between the homes of friends or relatives.
• Boarding house resident: Staying in a boarding house on a medium to long-term basis.
• Marginally housed: Living in caravan parks for financial reasons or because there are problems accessing mainstream housing.

There are a number of different reasons that can cause homelessness including – physical or emotional abuse, domestic violence, financial problems, physical or mental illness, family or relationship breakdown, drug and alcohol abuse and overcrowding.

The Australian Youth Homelessness report 2006, gave staggering figures, which cannot be ignored. Every night on the streets of Australia there are almost 22,000 homeless youth – youth under the age of 18 years of age, which is seven homeless students per 1,000.