How to Rent an Apartment if You Have Low Income

The stress of trying to find an apartment to fit your budget can be almost overwhelming. If you are disabled or on unemployment, it can seem impossible. Prices of rents, food, utilities and transportation in some areas keep going up, while people's jobs and pay keep going down. Real estate-related costs, such as insurance and taxes also keep going up, which means the money to pay for the property must come from somewhere. That means that an apartment that you could rent for $500 a few years ago, is now renting for $800, for example. What is a person to do, if disability income or job loss cannot begin to cover this new rent? Here are some tips that may help.

Things You'll Need

• Phone book
• Online phone book or directory for your area

Instructions

1. Know that not all low-income housing is under the HUD umbrella. Many times churches or other nonprofit agencies have sliding-scale apartments in nice neighborhoods. Most of the time, the rent is in accordance with your income and ability to pay. Many times the utilities are included in the rent, along with other types of services, like some phone costs.

2. Look first at the non-HUD rentals. Call your city hall and ask who you need to speak with to find out about nonprofit or low-income housing. In many areas there is a list of apartment complexes that are sliding scale. You may wish to use the phrase "sliding scale" when you speak to people in your search. Another term is "subsidized housing." That just means that the city, county or state picks up the tab for much of the rent.

3. Call your county social services or housing office. All these numbers are in the phone book. You can also enter the name of your city in your search engine and it might look like this: "Boston subsidized housing," or "low income housing." Any of those might work and you can find the phone number. You may or may not have to go to the offices to apply or to get more information.

4. Find out about Section 8 housing. HUD, or Housing and Urban Development, has a program in most areas and it is handled through the state offices where you are. You can search this online by putting in "Section 8 housing" or find the phone numbers in your phone book under your state listings. You will be looking for "HUD" or "Housing and Urban Development." If you cannot find such listings, call any state office number and they can give it to you.

5. Prepare to show your financial picture. HUD has an application process that is quite thorough and will dig into your personal finances in terms of what you own, how much you get and who you get it from, who you support and many other personal information, so be ready for that. With HUD, or Section 8, you may not have as much choice about where you live, depending on how the program is run in your area. On the other hand, many HUD programs allow for you to find a landlord who is willing to take Section 8, and HUD will pay half or more than half of your rent and possibly help with utilities through another office. You will be required to stay a year in most cases.

6. Call your local county social services for cash rental assistance to be able to rent a normally priced apartment. If you are looking for work, have a child, are disabled, in recovery or other situation, the county oftentimes has funds available to keep you in an apartment within your financial means or to help you bridge a financial gap.

7. Find a house or apartment you can share with someone who also is struggling to meet the rent or mortgage. Just by looking in the classifieds under "For Rent" or "Want to Share" you can sometimes find a great situation in a house that is much bigger than if you had rented an apartment on your own.

Tips & Warnings

• If you are disabled, you may want to consider assisted living facilities until you can find something else if you want to live independently. You will find listings under that heading in your local yellow pages.

• Make sure the neighborhood you are looking at is a safe one. Go through the area several times at different times of the day and at night, and take a friend. Sometimes areas that look alright in daylight come alive with a different scenario after dark, but you may not see this if you are only there in the daytime. Talk to people you know about the area and get as much information as you can before signing a lease that you may not be able to get out of. If nothing else, you can go to your local police department and ask about that location and whether they think it is a safe area in which to reside. Real estate agencies that service that area may also help you with information regarding safety.

References

• HUD.gov: Home