I never ever take having a roof over my head for granted, particularly not in winter when it is raining, when it is cold. Having a place to call my own, I think it's a real privilege.

And I firmly believe you're only about three major life events away from finding out what it's like to be desperate. You lose your job, your marriage breaks up, illness or injury, and all of a sudden, you find yourself in a really precarious situation, and I've been thinking about that because of the sad case in Auckland in the news at the moment.

An elderly woman believed to be in her 70s was found dead in her car. She had been living in her Suzuki Swift for months, and despite neighbours and the suburb where she was parked, attempting to raise the alarm because they didn't think she'd make it through winter alive, it was months before finally, somebody contacted staff at the Auckland City Mission. They did a welfare check and they found the woman dead.

There are hundreds, literally hundreds of people living in their cars around Auckland City alone, and I imagine wherever you are in the country you will have people sleeping in their cars.

Nothing is certain and nothing is secure, and while it's unlikely I'll end up parked in a suburb somewhere around Auckland, sleeping in my VW, I never ever take having a roof over my head for granted.