'Pandemic hero' living in a caravan amid housing crisis

Soaring rents force carer and cleaner to find alternative home

- ALEX ROSS

For two years, Kirsty Brett searched for a flat in the Essex town of Canvey Island. Staying with her parents and earning £27,000 as a carer, the 34-year-old thought she was in a good position to find a suitable one-bedroom flat she could move into and gain her independence.

But all she could find were apartments priced at £1,300 and £1,400 a month in a local authority, Castle Point, where average rents increased 7 per cent last year.

“How could I afford that and then pay my bills and for my food and other things on top of that on my wage all by myself?” she said. “I had no option but to look at other ways to move out from my parents.”

Ms Brett decided to move 80 miles to move in with her sister in Bury St Edmunds, before taking the plunge to buy a £10,000 caravan in May, selling two cars and taking out a loan to pay for it.

“I was happy to do it but I also felt like I was forced down this avenue if I wanted to live on my own,” she said.

She initially pitched on a residential and holiday park, paying £800 a month, before, a few weeks ago, moving on to a friend’s driveway in Bury St Edmunds. Her friend, due to ill health, needed help with errands and so it made sense to live outside the home, she said.