Explainer
What is Fair Market Rent?
Fair Market Rent is the cap on what a Section 8 voucher will pay each month. Here's how HUD calculates it, why it varies by county, and how to read the FMR table on your city's page.
The short version
Fair Market Rent (FMR) is a number HUD publishes once per fiscal year for every county and metropolitan area in the United States. It represents roughly the 40th percentile of recent rents for standard, modest, non-luxury units in that area — meaning 40% of recent rentals priced at or below that level. For Section 8 Housing Choice Vouchers, FMR is the cap: your voucher won't cover rent above that figure, with limited exceptions.
How HUD calculates FMR
The methodology is a multi-step process based primarily on the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS), supplemented by Random Digit Dialing (RDD) telephone surveys in select metro areas, the Bureau of Labor Statistics' rent-of-primary-residence index, and the Census Housing Vacancy Survey. HUD adjusts the raw ACS data for recency, applies a "recent mover" filter, removes utility costs to produce a contract-rent figure, and finally caps the year-over-year change to prevent extreme swings.
The output is a single FMR for each unit size — studio, 1BR, 2BR, 3BR, and 4BR — for each FMR area. In non-metro America, an FMR area is usually a single county. In metro areas, multiple counties may share one FMR.
Why it's set at the 40th percentile
The 40th percentile is a deliberate compromise. Setting FMR too low (say, the 25th percentile) would mean voucher holders can only afford the very cheapest units, concentrating poverty and limiting choice. Setting it too high (the 60th or 75th percentile) would inflate the cost of the program and let landlords charge above-market rent. The 40th percentile target keeps vouchers usable in modest, working-class neighborhoods without subsidizing luxury units.
Reading the FMR table on your city page
Each city page lists the FY2024 FMR for unit sizes from studio through four bedrooms. These are contract rents — what the landlord receives — and don't include utility allowances. If utilities are tenant-paid, the local PHA will compute a separate utility allowance and your voucher will cover slightly less in rent so the combined amount stays within the FMR.
Exception payment standards
Some PHAs are allowed to set a "payment standard" between 90% and 110% of FMR, and a smaller number can request approval to go higher in tight rental markets. This means actual approved rents on the ground may differ slightly from the published FMR — your PHA's payment standard is the more authoritative number for what your voucher will cover.
Small Area Fair Market Rents
In a growing number of metropolitan areas, HUD publishes Small Area FMRs (SAFMRs) at the ZIP-code level instead of the metro level, to reflect that rents vary dramatically across neighborhoods within a single metro. SAFMRs are not the norm in rural America — most non-metro counties continue to use a single county-wide FMR — but if your town is in a SAFMR-designated metro, the ZIP-level figure may apply instead of the county-wide one.
Where to look up your area
Browse our state directory to find your town and see its FY2024 FMR alongside the local Public Housing Agency contact info. For the official, authoritative figure, the HUD User FMR dataset is the source we draw from.