Is there a better way to provide rental assistance?

Understanding the difference between the voucher and direct aid models

With rising costs of rent, child care, groceries, utilities, and more, it’s getting harder to make ends meet in Connecticut.  For lots of people, the cost of housing is the biggest stressor. But can anything be done to help?

More than half of Connecticut tenants are spending more than 30% of their income on rent. A single person would need to make at least $34.54 an hour – about $69,000 a year before taxes – to afford the average cost of a two-bedroom apartment in Connecticut without spending more than 30% of their pay on rent. More than half of people in Connecticut make less than $54,000 a year, meaning most can’t afford that cost without being severely rent-burdened.

Housing vouchers provide desperately needed relief to many renters. However, help isn’t immediate, and Connecticut’s existing rent assistance program isn’t funded enough to match the need. About 48,000 people applied for the Rental Assistance Program (RAP) and Section 8 vouchers the last time the Connecticut Department of Housing opened the waitlist. Of those, 5,000 were chosen to be added to the RAP waitlist, and 7,000 for Section 8. 

Direct rental assistance is one way to better connect renters with the help they need. It’s been tested in other places. Could it work here in Connecticut?

How do vouchers work?

Housing vouchers bridge the gap between what a family can afford to pay and what rent costs in their area. But because the state has under-funded voucher programs, people can spend months or years on a waiting list before they get their voucher. 

So, then why do 40% of vouchers expire before they’re used?

The voucher process is a lot more complicated than getting approved, signing a lease, and handing the voucher to a landlord. 

There can be prejudice against vouchers. Connecticut law makes it illegal for a landlord to discriminate against a tenant because they use a housing voucher, but that doesn’t stop it from happening. Contact the Connecticut Fair Housing Center if you think you have been discriminated against based on a voucher.

And even with a voucher, it can still be hard to find an affordable place to live that’s in a place where people can get to their jobs, schools, or community.

What is direct rental assistance?

Direct rental assistance is designed to simplify the voucher process. Renters still receive their housing assistance money, but it goes straight to them instead of in a voucher to a landlord. The landlord never needs to know that a tenant is using assistance to make ends meet.

Unlike housing vouchers, which are often tied to specific landlords and have complicated eligibility requirements, direct rental assistance is more flexible. Tenants can use it for any qualified rental property.

In other words, direct rental assistance cuts out a lot of the extra and unnecessary burdens of housing vouchers, for landlords and for tenants. The goal is for direct rental assistance to make it easier and faster to find and rent a home

Which model is better?

Rental assistance programs – both vouchers and direct rental assistance – provide crucial financial freedom for people who are living paycheck to paycheck, seniors on fixed incomes, and people with disabilities. 

An ongoing direct rental assistance pilot in Philadelphia has already seen success. PHLHousing+ launched in 2022 and has since helped hundreds of families find places to live without having to navigate the complicated, administrative process that comes with traditional vouchers. So far, people participating in the pilot have also had more options for where to live. A single mother of five enrolled in the program said that receiving housing aid directly has lowered her stress and made her decision of where to live easier. 

We won’t know how direct rental assistance could benefit Connecticut until we have more data. That’s why The Connecticut Project is launching a direct rental assistance pilot program, to see how it can help people here, and if it does empower people more than vouchers. 

Housing is a human right. But when you barely make enough money to pay for rising rent, you’re more likely to be evicted, less likely to save up a rainy day fund for emergencies, and can be faced with the tough decision between paying rent and buying food. Launching a direct rental assistance pilot here is one of the next steps to making Connecticut a place where everyone has access to opportunities, no matter their zip code.