Pal wanting a great home (5)
I believe the answer is:
place
'home' is the definition.
(I know that home can be written as place)
'pal wanting a great' is the wordplay.
'wanting' suggests deleting specific letters (to want something can mean to lack it or need it).
'great' becomes 'ace' (I've seen this before).
'pal' with 'a' taken out is 'pl'.
'pl'+'ace'='PLACE'
(Other definitions for place that I've seen before include "vacancy" , "Venue" , "Locus" , "Identify -- station" , "Endearingly pretty" .)