Accessible Homes Australia (“AHA”) provides specialist disability home pathways and solutions to Australians participating in the National Disability Insurance Scheme under the Specialist Disability Accommodation (“SDA”) program.
Home solutions, within everyday communities, created to suit individual needs and circumstances.
Currently within Australia there are approximately 16,000 people with disabilities living within shared support accommodation and around 6,000 young people within residential aged facilities. In total, it is estimated there are currently over 28,000 Australians living with a disability, requiring supported specialist accommodation who have unmet personal living accommodation demands.
There is an immediate need to provide housing solutions to these Australians so they can enjoy a better of quality of life, greater social interaction, more independence and freedom of choice.
The Australian Government recently acknowledged this dire need and through the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) launched the Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA) scheme.
For eligible participants of the SDA, funding is now available specifically for providers, like AHA, to offer specialist housing to those who require and deserve it. This exciting initiative finally offers people with specialist supported accommodation needs the opportunity to live with more abundance, connectivity and choice. A right that every Australian should enjoy.
The founder of Accessible Homes Australia is Perry Cross AM, a C2 ventilated quadriplegic who was injured in a football tackle at the age of 19. For the past 25 years, since sustaining his injury, Perry has lived with his family, originally residing in his parents home, moving onto his sister’s, and in recent years his brother’s home for support. It was simply never an option for Perry to live in his own home, until the SDA was implemented.
With the new world that the SDA offered, Perry could finally contemplate the question of, “what if?”. What if he could live with more independence? What if he could enjoy more freedom? What if he could be immersed in a central, everyday neighbourhood where he could visit a cafe? What if he could enjoy a life in a purpose built home to support his specialist accommodation needs? That was a question that was met with anticipation and naturally, a lot of nerves.
Perry now looks back on his decision with sheer gratitude. As an approved participant of the SDA – he was able to access and move into a new apartment. For the first time in his life, he has a place to call his own home. The new lease on life he feels is one that, he says, only someone with specialist needs can actually describe.
Perry is now passionate about helping others living with supported living needs to find their own home and so, Accessible Homes Australia was born. Perry invited partners to join him at AHA who are all property, housing and building industry veterans. Their collective aim is to assist participants in navigating the SDA’s eligibility and registration process, and provide high quality design and building plans that meet both the scheme’s strict criteria, and the participants’ individual care needs. The AHA team will also deliver the design, construction and completion of a home so that it may be granted to an SDA participant as that person’s permanent home.
Meet The Team
Perry Cross AM
Tom Ray
Tim Douglas
Jason Doerr
Michael Sykes
