A year after they opened, more than a thousand people have been given a roof over their heads and hot meals through the homeless shelters a Rotorua man funded by mortgaging his own house.

Fifty-year-old Tiny Deane poured money into what has now become three large night shelters for the city's homeless.

Photo: RNZ / Jordan Bond

He now has government funding and is feeding and housing up to a hundred people a night.

Photo: RNZ / Jordan Bond

And as Jordan Bond reports, it's meant a chance at a better life for many people.