How to Sign Up for Section 8 in Florida
Through the Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher program, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) subsidizes private market rent for low-income families. Governed by federal law, local public housing agencies (PHAs) across the nation use the same application protocol. Based on your income, however, you may qualify for Section 8 in one part of Florida but not another. Impacted waiting lists, thanks to demand that exceeds a PHA's supply of Section 8 vouchers, present another potential stumbling block to securing Section 8 housing in Florida.
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Instructions
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Locate the PHA that covers your area. HUD maintains a searchable database at its website. Call your PHA and ask about the status of its Section 8 waiting list. Most PHAs in Florida use a waiting list due to high demand for, and low supply of, Section 8 vouchers.
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Ensure that your household income falls within the limit, which is 50 percent of an area's median, for the Section 8 program. For example, a family of four residing in the Gainesville, Florida metropolitan area cannot earn more than $30,650 a year, based on HUD's 2010 income limits. In the Fort Lauderdale metro, that number increases to $39,600.
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Get on the waiting list if it is open. As of October 2010, The Miami-Dade Public Housing Agency notes that its wait list is closed. It received more than 71,000 applications when it opened in July of 2008. The Tampa Housing Authority's Section 8 wait list is also closed, as of October 2010. The Tampa Housing Authority explains that it only has 5,209 vouchers to distribute to Hillsborough County residents and over 10,000 families entered the wait list when it opened in October 2006.
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Fill out a pre-application if your area's list is open or when it reopens. The Code of Federal Regulations requires PHAs to provide public notice in newspapers and other appropriate media when they reopen their Section 8 waiting list. Generally your PHA has you enter information about all members of your household, your employment situation and your household income on a Section 8 pre-application.
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Verify your eligibility after your PHA contacts you with notification that you have reached the top of their wait list. You can confirm eligibility with birth certificates and Social Security numbers to verify the identities of all household members and paycheck stubs and tax returns to document income.
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