PORTLAND, Ore. – The Section 8 waitlist is opening for the first time in four years in Multnomah County.
People who make less than half of the median income in Portland can apply for a Section 8 housing voucher online between September 13 and 17. With a voucher, they can afford market-rate housing but just spend 30 percent of their income on rent. Subsidies, mostly from federal money, make up the rest.
In Portland, you have to make less than $25,700 annually if you live alone to qualify.
View post on imgur.comNot everyone who applies for a voucher will get one. Only 3,000 people who apply for Section 8 will make the waitlist. The last time the list was open in 2012, about 21,000 people applied.
"The Housing Choice Voucher program is one of the most effective tools to help people earning low incomes find rental housing in the private market," said Michael Buonocore, executive director of Home Forward. "There aren't nearly enough vouchers to meet the need in our community, so it’s really important for people to sign up when the lottery for the waiting list becomes available."
It will take two to three* years before all of the people on the waitlist get vouchers, according to Home Forward, Multnomah County’s housing authority.
The problem is that there is a limited number of vouchers available to Portland residents – less than 10,000 vouchers for an estimated 40,000 households that could use them.
For people with vouchers, it recently became easier to find a home. In March, Multnomah County increased the amount of money Section 8 renters can spend, meaning they can afford some of the market-rate apartments even as rental prices spike.
Before the change, about a quarter of people who got a Section 8 voucher had to give them back because they couldn’t find places to rent within the parameters of the program.
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*This article previously cited Home Forward statistics that it would take four to five years to go through the waitlist. A spokesman for Home Forward said the county knows how great the need is and it's goal is to give out all vouchers within a maximum of three years. Once that happens, Home Forward will open the waitlist again.