I've been reading through the PG county housing choice voucher program and I'm a little confused by the order of operations and timing for some things. I'm hoping someone can help get me straightened out here.

The main thing I'm trying to get my head around is the order of operations. It seems like it's:

1 - get PG county rental license

2 - find tenant

3 - submit property to section 8 for inspection (any idea how long this takes?)

4 - repeat inspection until it passes

5 - tenant moves in, start collecting rent.

Do I have it in the correct order? Am I missing any steps?

Also, when applying for a PG county rental license, there is an option you can select for "property is a Housing Choice Voucher (Section 8) property". Does this trigger anything? Does it commit me to the section 8 program exclusively? Should I get this license before or after I find a tenant? Do I need to do anything to get either myself or the property approved before I list it? 

Thanks in advance

Hi Ari, 

I'm in the process of doing the section tenant to balance my portfolio, and the first thing that comes to mind, for me to tell you, is that it is not for the impatient landlords. The process is excruciatingly SLOW!. You will put in a non section 8 tenant in the property months before you get through the Section 8 process. Be mindful here that you're expected to keep the property vacant, sanitary and in living condition while you wait. I've attended two Landlord briefings, so I know what i'm talking about.

Re: Rental License: It depends where your property is in PG County. Some cities in PG county issue and administer their own rental licenses. 

There's a pre-inspection checklist that they provide us at the landlord briefings. This checklist shows some of the items they will check when they come to inspect the property. 

My steps so far: 

1. List your property with Housing. They publish a listing to clients every week. You can also put it on www.gosection8.com

2. Select a tenant from all the prospects that show interest. Pick a few and do credit and background check. You will get a lot of Tire kickers here. They will show interest that day and you will never hear from them again.

3. Get to know the tenant and have them fill out a request for tenancy among half a dozen other documents.  Submit the paper work to housing. I put the request for tenancy document in bold because it's the document that pretty much kickstart things.

4. Wait for inspection

5. Wait.

6. Wait again.

7. I'm still waiting.

My advise, if you're local, is to attend one of the landlord briefings. The lady that champions the briefing is amazing!

I hope this helps.

JI