Prices have risen sharply in Albuquerque's metro housing market leading many renters to seek rental assistance.
According to KOB 4 News, due to rent prices drastically rising in the past few years many renters are looking for programs to assist them in paying the higher rent prices.
"On an annual basis, we'll receive typically anywhere between 4,000-to-5,000 applications for maybe a couple hundred vouchers that we have available," Linda Bridge, the executive director of the Albuquerque Housing Authority, told KOB 4 News.
As businesses are moving into the city, they're pushing renters out who can't compete, moving them further out to areas with cheaper costs of living. While some programs can assist with paying rent, the biggest issue is the lack of available units. This lack of supply is driving prices up, and people who can afford the units will buy them before said programs can take advantage of the units.
The rising rent is also an issue for those who seek rent through government rent programs because there is a cap on how much an individual can receive for rent through the program, and rent is starting to surpass that limit.
"The City of Albuquerque, a few years back, did a study that indicated that, for very low and extremely low-income populations, there's a shortage of 15,000 units in our city – and that was before our current rise in our housing market," Bridge added.