In order to calculate where you stand in relation to a true living wage, you must have the fair market rent structure for the area in which you live. But—the government report issued on fair market rents is in a data format that requires Adobe®Reader® . This is a free software program, but it takes a great deal of time to download on a 28.8 modem — which is still what a considerable percentage of the country uses to access the Internet.

If you already have Adobe®Reader®, you may download the full reports by visiting this link at HUD.

Would you like more HUD data, or historical information on Fair Market Rents? Try this link. (If it brings up an error page, let us know--the government changes it constantly.) Want to read about FMRs and how they are established? Go to the Fair Market Rent preamble.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has released the preliminary FMR figures for 2008. The HUD table has been broken down into states and, in the case of large states, farther subdivided into metro and non-metro areas. We plan to have data from all 50 states up on the Internet in an easily readable format. See the vast difference in a universal living wage in our country!

You'll find that the cost of housing is not standing still. Can you afford to live in paradise? The cost of a one bedroom apartment in Honolulu, HI has increased $6.75. If you think it's expensive to live in Westchester County, NY, you're correct. It costs $3.35 per hour more to live there than it did a mere 18 months ago.

Can't find your city listed? Look in the next largest geographic area (usually county.)

FMR Standard

FMRs are gross rent estimates; they include shelter rent and the cost of utilities, except telephone. HUD sets FMRs to assure that a sufficient supply of rental housing is available to program participants. To accomplish this objective, FMRs must be both high enough to permit a selection of units and neighborhoods and low enough to serve as many families as possible. The level at which FMRs are set is expressed as a percentile point within the rent distribution of standard quality rental housing units. The current definition used is the 40th percentile rent, the dollar amount below which 40 percent of standard quality rental housing units rent. The 40th percentile rent is drawn from the distribution of rents of units which are occupied by recent movers (renter households who moved into their unit within the past 15 months).

FMRs have been increased to the 50th percentile rent in those metropolitan areas where a FMR increase is most needed to promote residential choice, help families move closer to areas of job growth, and deconcentrate poverty. 50thPercentile is indicated by an " * ".