A lack of insurance is preventing hundreds of Lismore residents from repairing their flood-damaged homes as government financial help remains frustratingly out of reach for many.
A recent canvassing of homes in the flood-battered regions found more than half were uninsured when the disaster struck in early 2022.
Last month, community outreach group Resilient Lismore conducted a survey of 295 households and found many were just scraping by with limited access to a working bathroom or kitchen.
Resident Jenna Breeze is living in a caravan with her husband and six-year-old daughter and refers to their uninhabitable former home as, "the little crack house on the prairie".
"That's what it looks like," Ms Breeze told AAP on Wednesday.
"There's no kitchen, there's no bathroom. There's still mud on the walls."
Many people, including pensioners, were just trying to make it through the winter without a hot shower, or with five minutes of warm water from a camp shower, Ms Breeze said.
She is one of the lucky ones who in April this year was offered a buyback from the government, which she described as "generous enough" to pay off the home loan and start looking for somewhere else to live.
Others in the same street have not yet heard whether the government will also buy their stricken properties.
"If you sell your house as it is - a flood house - it's going to be worth peanuts," Ms Breeze said.
Resilient Lismore is calling for the government to release more funding to enable retrofits and give people access to basic amenities in the short term.
Executive director Elly Bird said the roll-out of funds, being coordinated by the Northern Rivers Reconstruction Corporation (NRRC), had left residents hanging and compounded distress.
"For so many respondents to report that their kitchens and/or bathrooms are in poor condition - or worse, non-existent - shows the severity of the problem and underlines the urgency with which this needs to be addressed," Ms Bird said.
The group is urging the government to release more funding slated for "tranche two" of the program, and to revise the eligibility for retrofit pay-outs.
"The eligibility now for retrofit or raising is for homes that are below a 1 in 20 flood, that means that the people we have just surveyed will get no further assistance," Ms Bird said.
Last week Premier Chris Minns admitted the buyback scheme was not working and called for a reset, committing to send the emergency services and planning ministers to the region to take stock.
The NRRC has so far identified 340 homes as eligible for house raising or retrofit funding offers, and 1100 for buybacks - having received over 6000 applications for assistance.
