The Stepped and Tiered Rent Demonstration is a randomized controlled trial in which 10 public housing authorities (PHAs) are implementing new rent policies: five are implementing a “stepped rent” and five are implementing a “tiered rent.” The new rent policies are intended to reduce administrative burden and provide incentives for assisted households to increase their income, while being roughly budget-neutral for PHAs. In the tiered rent policy, households are grouped into income tiers and all households within a tier have the same total tenant payment. Any income changes within a tier or within the usual three-year rent recertification cycle will not affect the household’s rent. The stepped rent policy is a more substantial departure from the standard rent policy. Each household starts out paying an income-based total payment—nearly identical to the standard rent rules—for one year. But beginning in the second year, that payment “steps up” by a fixed amount each year, independent of the household’s income. The stepped and tiered rent policies both include hardship provisions meant to limit any negative consequences for participating households.

The long-term evaluation will determine whether households subject to the new rent rules experience different outcomes than those in the control group (subject to standard rent rules). Household-level outcomes measured will include earnings and employment, housing subsidy levels, material hardship, and other measures of family well-being. The evaluation will also include an implementation evaluation and a cost study. This report is the first interim report associated with the demonstration. It presents the stepped and tiered rent policies, and describes the process of designing and implementing the policies and associated research activities. At the time of publication, study enrollment is ongoing.