Yardi, RentCafe Offer Hurricane Harvey Displacement Service

Texas National Guard soldiers arrive in Houston on August 27, 2017, to aid residents affected by Hurricane Harvey. (Photo: Texas Army National Guard)

So many people lost everything — homes, cars, and all their possessions — in the wrath wrought by Hurricane Harvey. But there’s another category of people who were just as badly affected by this record-breaking storm: renters. 

In some cases, renters are required to continue paying rent on uninhabitable apartments and homes, and some can’t even work, with many businesses either wiped away, flooded, or otherwise damaged. If your apartment or home is uninhabitable and you’ve notified your landlord about terminating your lease in writing, the next step is finding someplace else to live. This can be daunting, but RentCafe and its parent company, Yardi, have teamed up to help.

The Hurricane Harvey Disaster Response Page, hosted on www.rentcafe.com, allows anyone in need of immediate accommodation to find housing options in the area. Property managers who have available units for rent – both apartments and houses – can add them on the platform so that displaced residents may easily find a temporary or permanent place to call home. There is no charge for housing providers to list their properties on the website or for prospective renters to use it.

Yardi has also launched a hotline that evacuees looking for housing can call for housing assistance. The toll-free number is (844) 363-6317.