Guide
How to prepare for a HUD recertification: a step-by-step checklist
Updated · 6 min read · By the Rentsi team
Informational, not legal advice. Rules differ by program, state and city, and they change. Check the current HUD handbook or notices, your contract administrator or housing authority, and a local attorney before acting.
For HUD multifamily properties, including project-based Section 8, every household's income and composition must be recertified at least once a year. A recert that starts late is the most common way to end up with a household paying the wrong rent, or with a missing signature in the file. Here's a practical order of operations.
1. Know every household's anniversary date
The annual recertification is due on the household's recertification anniversary date, usually based on the move-in date or the last annual recert. Keep one list of every household's next date so nothing depends on memory or a sticky note.
2. Send the 120, 90 and 60-day notices
HUD's occupancy handbook for multifamily properties (HUD Handbook 4350.3) has owners send an initial recertification notice about 120 days before the anniversary date, a first reminder at 90 days and a second reminder at 60 days. Each notice tells the household what to bring, the deadline, and what happens if they don't respond in time. Keep a copy of every notice and the date you sent it.
3. Collect the documents
Ask for everything at once with a written list. Typical items:
- Income: recent pay stubs, benefit award letters (Social Security, SSI, pensions, unemployment), child support and any other regular income
- Assets: bank statements and other asset records
- Deductions you may need to verify: medical expenses for elderly or disabled households, child care costs
- Household changes: anyone who moved in or out, births, students
- Signed consent and verification forms required by current HUD guidance (for example HUD-9887 and 9887-A)
4. Verify income, including EIV
Verify what the household reports using the methods HUD requires, and review the household's EIV (Enterprise Income Verification) report for the recertification. Look into any difference between what the household reported and what EIV shows, and document how you resolved it.
Watch for rule changes
The Housing Opportunity Through Modernization Act (HOTMA) changed several income and asset rules, and HUD has phased the changes in. Confirm which rules apply to your property and your software's TRACS version before you calculate anything.
5. Complete and sign the 50059
Calculate rent and assistance in your certified HUD software and produce form HUD-50059. The head of household, the other adult household members as required, and the owner's representative sign it. Put the signed copy and all verification in the tenant file.
6. Give notice of any rent change
If the tenant's rent goes up, the household must receive advance written notice before the increase takes effect (generally 30 days for a timely recertification). Rules are different when a household recertifies late; check the handbook.
7. Submit and close the loop
Transmit the certification through TRACS (directly or through your contract administrator) by your deadline. Then update the tenant's rent and the subsidy amount on your ledgers from the effective date, and set the next anniversary date.
A quick recert checklist
- Anniversary date on the calendar
- 120-day notice sent and filed
- 90 and 60-day reminders sent (if needed)
- Documents collected and verified
- EIV report reviewed and discrepancies resolved
- 50059 signed by everyone required
- Rent change notice given
- Submitted to TRACS; ledgers updated
How Rentsi helps
Rentsi's HUD property management software tracks every household's recert date with reminder letters at 120, 90 and 60 days, keeps a file checklist per household with missing items flagged, and has a place for each EIV report. It doesn't calculate rent under HUD rules or submit to TRACS: that stays in your certified software.