Nerves are fraying for Westport residents displaced after historic flooding caused extensive damage to their properties just over ten weeks ago.
Currently officials are working to find suitable long term solutions for over 100 residents with nowhere to go.
Amanda Loversidge's family is one of many Westport residents just trying to make do.
Her family of six, and two dogs, have been living in a motel since their home was badly damaged in record floods - ten weeks ago.
"A couple of days ago I thought I can not do this anymore, I just can't," she told Newshub.
Her story is a common one, but it's one that authorities are becoming increasingly concerned with.
Buller District Council recovery manager Bob Dickson says the need for extra housing is going to be "very crucial" moving forward.
"We've got people who were renting properties and those properties may not necessarily be available to them, we've got people with particular social needs and disabilities they need to be accommodated in the medium to longer-term… So getting those houses on-site as soon as humanly possible into next year."
Buller District Mayor Jamie Cleine says the months are dragging on.
"We're just conscious of that getting to be a few months now and it's a few more months of people being in the likes of motels and hotel accommodation which is in anyone's book not an ideal environment to be living in long-term," he said.
Some residents are so fed up with their lack of options they've decided to go home to damp, mouldy houses.
Authorities are so concerned they've commissioned specialist teams who will door-knock every red and yellow-stickered home to do welfare checks.
A community hub managed by Mary O'Loughlin has been set up - helping a region that was forced out by nature, then locked down by COVID.
"We had that intense three, four weeks and everybody was just in survival mode - let's get through this," O'Loughlin told Newshub.
"Then COVID came, we got locked down and then after that people have gone 'wow I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm not going to be back in my house for this long and where am I going to live, how am I going to cope? How am I going to do this right through?'
"People are getting a lot more frayed."
The floodwaters have long dried up, but many residents are still struggling to stay afloat.
