Rapid Re-Housing is an entitlement program intended to limit the amount of families and individuals spending extended amounts of time in a shelter. The name is derived from its purpose: to get people who have lost a home or been evicted into a new home as quickly as possible. HUD began accepting applications for Rapid Re-Housing in 2008. In 2009, congress appropriated approximately $1.5 billion to the program.
Overall, the program has met some controversy. The biggest problem is that it offers no permanent solutions. Unlike Section 8, which so many of our landlord clients are familiar with, the Rapid Recovery program has a shelf life of a year.
We do not represent tenants nor do we assist tenants in using these programs. However, we do believe it is important to stay informed of such programs as these to better assist our landlords.If you have a tenant who is currently using the Rapid Re-Housing subsidy, there are a few things you should know.
First of all, the tenants share of the rent increases every three months. Generally, the increase is 10%. Thus, if the tenant is responsible for half of the rent at the time the lease starts, three months later he or she will be responsible for 60%. Three months after that he or she will be responsible for 70% and so on.
This is helpful to landlords because they can gauge relatively quickly whether or not the tenant is going to be able to afford to stay in the residence. After twelve months, the tenant will be responsible for 100% of the rent. A tenant can request an extension of the program, but those extensions are generally three months or less.
Despite what many tenants seem to think, no Landlord enjoys evicting a tenant. It is time consuming and can be costly. Even though our firm can evict a tenant relatively quickly and for a nominal cost compared to other Utah eviction lawers, lost rent and property damage is common.
Becoming involved with the Rapid Re-Housing proram may help you to fill empty unites quickly. Furthermore, our govenment has a very good record of paying its bills on time. That means you can expect to get the government’s portion of the rent on time, every month.
The downside is that you may get stuck with tenants who are unable to pay after a few months when their share of the rent increases.
