> I can definitely understand not realizing that you could lose access to your account if you lose your phone number. But once it happens the first time, could you not pick any free email that does not require 2FA, and warn fellow homeless to avoid gmail?

Almost every free email service I've tried now requires a phone number to setup. Even protonmail required it for a brief while, although they now are back to captcha and a stern warning. I actually can't think of another free service besides protonmail that this isn't now true for.

An annoying trick some of them use is to allow you to setup the account and then lock it some time later. I've seen on immediate login (irritating waste of time) or after you've used it for awhile (what you used the account for is now held hostage unless you cough up a phone number).