Tenant Based Rental Assistance

HOME Investment Partnerships Program (HOME) permits Participating Jurisdictions (PJs) to create flexible programs that provide assistance to individual households to help them afford the housing costs of market-rate units. These programs are known as "tenant-based rental assistance," or TBRA. HOME TBRA programs differ from other types of HOME rental housing activities in three key ways:

TBRA programs help individual households, rather than subsidizing particular rental projects.

TBRA assistance moves with the tenant—if the household no longer wishes to rent a particular unit, the household may take its TBRA and move to another rental property.

The level of TBRA subsidy varies—the level of subsidy is based upon the income of the household, the particular unit the household selects, and the PJ’s rent standard (rather than being tied to the PJ’s high and low HOME rents).

There are many different types of TBRA programs, but the most common type provides payments to make up the difference between the amount a household can afford to pay for housing and the local rent standards. Other TBRA programs help tenant pay for costs associated with their housing, such as security and utility deposits.