Housing issues

600 square metres of dirt is a thing of the past.

When driving Roadtrains in the area roughly bounded by Albany, Wagin, Lake King, Esperance up to Salmon Gums and across to Beaumont I was astounded by the number of farmhouses, and associated buildings, that were sitting unoccupied.
When a farm of say 2000 acres once was a viable business, all of these houses were occupied, but as it became less viable for smaller farms to operate  the owners either bought surrounding properties, or were the ones  who sold out, and left the area.
With bigger and more efficient machines becoming available, fewer staff members were needed, so there were fewer employment opportunities.
Not only did this mean that there were unoccupied houses, it also meant that retailers in small towns no longer had a strong customer base, so they too closed down, and the town suffered.
Mullewa comes to mind, where I  drove Steiger tractors in 1980 when the farm had up to 20 permanent staff. When I went back for a look in 2022 the same property was now staffed by 2 permanent workers, with casuals during seeding and harvest.
IF they can get them!
Our tractors were huge for their day, at around 300hp, but the farm now uses 600hp tractors which cover a lot more ground than we did waaaay back!
The wheatbelt is littered with these once-vibrant towns, and dozens of houses now lie vacant.
Why do these homeless people not move into these houses, with farmers happy to have them live rent-free in exchange for looking after the property?
One woman I met, who was the typical bleating "poor me, I'm homeless with 3 kids living in my car" rejected the offer of cost-free use of a 4 bedroom home in the wheatbelt on the grounds that she would have to drive her little darlings 5km to and from the nearest schoolbus turnaround point. Spare me!
Coolgardie seems to have many vacant houses, but it does have a supermarket, a school, a pub, and 2 servos, a laundry, mechanical workshop etc while being only 30km from Kalgoorlie, where there is ample work.
When I was on my daily walk around Coolgardie I got chatting to a lady who was enjoying a morning coffee on her front veranda.
She offered to sell her relatively modern (30 years old maybe) home, fully furnished and with an enclosed garage, for $115,000. Walk in-walk out.
One property that I worked on, about 100km from Esperance, had no fewer than 5 vacant houses on it, all with ample water supply, power connected, and various empty sheds.
No residents though. Too bloody fussy. 
Surely ANY house that has a roof, power, water, sewerage etc is better than sleeping under a bridge or in your car?