Councils in England spent a record £1bn on temporary accommodation for homeless families last year.
This is more than 50% higher than the previous year, driven by the number of families living in short-term housing, including more than 150,000 children.
Councils spend £417m on housing families in hostels and bed and breakfasts, a 63% increase on the previous year.
The Labor government, which came to power in July, said it would tackle the growing problem by banning no-fault evictions and building 1.5 million homes over the next five years.
Experts say rising private rents, housing shortages and increased eviction rates have created a homelessness problem.
Romel Peters, 37, has been stuck in temporary accommodation in London with his two sons for more than a year after being evicted through no fault of his own by his private landlord.
The entire family sleeps in one room, while the “dirty” cooking and washing facilities are shared with other tenants.
“I can’t even describe how dirty this place is. I don’t cook here, my family cooks and brings food or I will cook at my mother’s house.
“I went to the kitchen to cook food and there was a cockroach in the microwave,” he said.
She worries about the effect on her children, who have no place to play or do work, while most of their toys are in storage.
Romel had been on the local council housing list for nearly a decade when he was evicted – only to be told he was no longer eligible because he was previously a private renter.
“I am devastated, I have been trying to contact the council for 18 months and no case worker has contacted me (back).
“I tried to find one myself and join a housing association, but it took a referral from the council and I didn’t get a reply for weeks.”
The council now wants the family to move to temporary accommodation three hours away in West Bromwich.
Because she didn’t want to leave her family network or her children’s school, she refused – and the council said it no longer had a duty to help her. The family is now homeless as they cannot afford to pay private rent.
The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show average rent increases in England ranging from 8.6% in England to 8.2% in Scotland and 7.9% in Wales.
Northern Ireland data lags behind the rest of the UK, with current figures available until the end of last year. The ONS reports a 10% rise in the country for the year to May 2024.
High inflation – partly caused by the Covid pandemic and high energy prices after Russia invaded Ukraine – kept rents high.
Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said: “It makes no sense that we continue to throw good money after bad into dingy homeless accommodation instead of investing in solutions that will help families find safe and secure homes.
“Decades of failure to build enough social housing combined with unaffordable rents and rising evictions have fueled homelessness.
“Many children are forced to become homeless in cramped and cramped hostels and B&Bs, sharing beds with their siblings, with no place to play or do work.
“Instead of putting billions into temporary solutions every year, the government should invest in affordable social housing and support councils to start building.”
Shelter is calling on the government to build 90,000 social homes over the next decade.
He and other housing charities point out the real cost of homelessness to society is much higher.
He said the figures, published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, showed £2.3bn was spent on paying households in temporary accommodation after housing benefit, paid for by the government, was included.
Housing is not just a problem in the UK – devolved countries are under pressure.
In Scotland, the government has declared a national housing emergency. It offers targeted funding of £2 million in 2023 to 2024 to local authorities facing the most significant temporary accommodation pressures.
The latest data on spending on temporary accommodation in Wales rose from £5.6m in 2018, to £42.9m in 2022 – a seven-fold increase – based on data from 20 out of 22 councils.
There is also a problem in Northern Ireland – the country’s Housing Executive Grainia Long said therere 11,000 places in temporary accommodationcompared to 3,000 before the Covid pandemic.
