NAHRO has submitted comments on HUD’s notice titled “Establishing a More Effective Fair Market Rent System; Using Small Area Fair Market Rents in Housing Choice Voucher Program Instead of the Current 50th Percentile FMRs.”

HUD’s proposed rule would mandatorily impose the use of Small Area Fair Market Rent (SAFMR) areas in 31 metropolitan areas, if it were implemented as currently written.

In NAHRO’s comments, we stated that PHAs should have the discretion to use either SAFMRs or FMRs depending on what made sense in a PHA’s rental housing market. NAHRO’s reasons to oppose the mandatory imposition of SAFMRs in certain areas can be divided into three broad categories: tenant welfare concerns; tenant choice concerns; and administrative burden concerns. NAHRO also noted that additional research needed to be done before mandatorily implementing SAFMRs and responded to specific solicitations about the rule from HUD.

Read NAHRO’s SAFMR comments here.

Read the proposed rule here.

Read NAHRO’s prior post on HUD’s SAFMR proposed rule here.