Last week, HUD published the Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 Fair Market Rents (FMRs) in the Federal Register. The new rents will become effective on October 1, 2019 for the Housing Choice Voucher program and Moderate Rehabilitation Single Room Occupancy program, unless HUD receives a valid request for reevaluation of specific area FMRs. The Schedule B addendum lists the Small Area FMRs for public housing authorities operating in the 24 metropolitan areas required to use Small Area FMRs.
HUD also uses the FMRs to determine initial renewal rents for some expiring project-based Section 8 contracts, rent ceilings for rental units in both the HOME Investment Partnerships program and the Emergency Solution Grants program, calculation of maximum award amounts for Continuum of Care recipients and the maximum amount of rent a recipient may pay for property leased with Continuum of Care funds and calculation of flat rents in Public Housing units.
The notice also includes responses to public comments from the June 5, 2019 Federal Register notice announcing two method changes in the calculation of FMRs. HUD is replacing the national trend factor with local and regional trend factors in order to improve the accuracy of the FMRs. In addition, for Small Area FMRs, HUD is including the “neighboring policy” as the next step when a ZIP Code Tabulation Area (ZCTA) does not have reliable data. This improvement determines if there is reliable data for bordering ZCTAs and uses this data before going to county-based Small Area FMRs.
