Harris County, GA
Harris County's two-bedroom Fair Market Rent is $1,088 a month and its HUD Median Family Income is $85,800. Within Georgia that is an unremarkable record: rank 74 of 159 county records, 1.3% above the state median of $1,074, close enough to the middle that the rank barely means anything.
What is not unremarkable is where the figures come from. They are published for the Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area, which crosses the state line, so the same $1,088 and the same $85,800 also apply in Russell County, Alabama — where they are not a median record at all.
Key HUD figures for Harris County, GA
HUD area: Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area
- Fair Market Rent (2BR)
- $1,088
- HUD Median Family Income
- $85,800
- Very Low Income (50%) — 4-person
- $42,350
- Low Income (80%) — 4-person
- $67,750
- HUD Year
- 2026
- FMR Year
- 2026
per month
area median family income, per year
annual household limit
annual household limit
income limits
fair market rents
Compare HUD Median Family Income
- Lower HUD MFI: Habersham County, GA $84,300/year
- Higher HUD MFI: Floyd County, GA $86,500/year
Fair Market Rents by bedroom
| Unit size | Monthly FMR | Annualized FMR |
|---|---|---|
| Studio / efficiency | $895 | $10,740 |
| 1 bedroom | $939 | $11,268 |
| 2 bedrooms(reference benchmark) | $1,088 | $13,056 |
| 3 bedrooms | $1,445 | $17,340 |
| 4 bedrooms | $1,703 | $20,436 |
Compare 2BR Fair Market Rent
- Lower 2BR FMR: Butts County, GA $1,075/month
- Higher 2BR FMR: Irwin County, GA $1,089/month
HUD income limits by household size
| Income limit category | 1 person | 2 persons | 3 persons | 4 persons | 5 persons | 6 persons | 7 persons | 8 persons |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Extremely Low Income | $17,800 | $21,640 | $27,320 | $33,000 | $38,680 | $44,360 | $50,040 | $55,720 |
| Very Low Income (50%) | $29,600 | $33,850 | $38,100 | $42,350 | $45,750 | $49,100 | $52,500 | $55,850 |
| Low Income (80%) | $47,450 | $54,200 | $60,950 | $67,750 | $73,200 | $78,600 | $84,000 | $89,450 |
These are HUD income limits for the Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area area. They are thresholds published by HUD, not an eligibility determination: individual programs apply their own rules, and adjusted-income definitions (deductions, allowances, and which household members count) can change whether a given household qualifies.
A median Georgia record, in a five-way tie
- Applicable HUD 2BR FMR
- $1,088
- Median 2BR FMR across county records in GA
- $1,074
- Difference
- +$14
- Difference (%)
- +1.3%
- Rank in state
- Tied at 74 of 159
The two-bedroom Fair Market Rent applicable to Harris County is approximately at the state median for GA. It is tied at rank 74 of 159 county records by 2BR FMR, sharing that rank with 4 other county records at the same rent.
The other 4 records in this HUD area use the same 2BR FMR and therefore share this rank.
Rank 1 is the highest 2BR FMR in the state, and county records with an identical rent share a rank. “Approximately at the state median” means within 2% of it. The median is taken across the 159 county records published for GA — it is not weighted by households or population, and it is not a median over unique HUD areas, so a HUD area covering several counties counts once per county record.
Sharing a rent figure is not the same as sharing a HUD area
Five Georgia county records publish a two-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $1,088: Chattahoochee, Harris, Marion, Muscogee and Sumter. Four of them share this page's HUD area. Sumter County does not — it is its own single-county HUD area that happens to land on the same rent.
The difference shows up immediately in the income limits, which is the part of the page most readers are actually here for. Sumter's HUD Median Family Income is $52,800 against Harris's $85,800, a gap of $33,000 on identical rent. Expressed as the benchmark this page publishes further down, Sumter is at 24.7% and Harris at 15.2%. A ranking table that sorts by rent will place these two counties side by side; almost nothing else about their HUD position matches.
15.2% of area income, against a Georgia range of 10.4% to 28.3%
- Annualized 2BR FMR
- $13,056
- HUD Median Family Income (annual)
- $85,800
- Annualized 2BR FMR as a share of HUD Median Family Income
- 15.2%
12 × $1,088
This is a ratio between two HUD benchmarks for the Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area area: the annualized two-bedroom Fair Market Rent divided by HUD Median Family Income. It is not a measured rent burden, not the share of income any particular family spends on housing, and not an affordability or eligibility determination.
One set of figures, two states
- HUD area name
- Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area
- HUD area code
- METRO17980M17980
- Income limits fiscal year
- FY2026
- Fair Market Rent fiscal year
- FY2026
HUD income limits and Fair Market Rents apply to HUD-defined areas that can cover multiple geographic entities. The values on this page are those assigned to this HUD entity record; entities sharing the same HUD area can have identical figures.
Other counties in this HUD area
4 other county records are assigned to this HUD area. Spans AL and GA.
The same $1,088 is a median rent in Georgia and a high rent in Alabama
Because the Columbus area straddles the state line, one of the five records HUD groups here is in another state. Russell County, Alabama carries exactly this page's figures, but Alabama's county-record median two-bedroom rent is $879, so the shared $1,088 puts Russell 23.8% above its state median at rank 13 of 67. Harris, with the identical number, sits 1.3% above Georgia's median at rank 74 of 159.
Neither ranking is wrong. GovCalculator compares each record against the records of its own state, because HUD publishes and administers by state, and a cross-state area is the one case where that makes a single set of figures produce two very different-looking pages.
The area also carries a city name Harris County does not contain. The Columbus metro's core is Muscogee County, and the FMR schedule on this page is the metro-wide schedule — which is why a largely rural county's published rent tracks an urban one's rather than its immediate neighbours'.
National economic context
The figures below are federal and national. They are not specific to Harris County and do not vary between counties.
Inflation (official BLS CPI-U national series)
Loading chart…
Fonte Dati: bls.gov — BLS CPI-U CUUR0000SA0
Mostra Dati in Tabella
| Date (YYYY-MM) | Year | Period | Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-07 | 2023 | M07 | 305.691 |
| 2023-08 | 2023 | M08 | 307.026 |
| 2023-09 | 2023 | M09 | 307.789 |
| 2023-10 | 2023 | M10 | 307.671 |
| 2023-11 | 2023 | M11 | 307.051 |
| 2023-12 | 2023 | M12 | 306.746 |
| 2024-01 | 2024 | M01 | 308.417 |
| 2024-02 | 2024 | M02 | 310.326 |
| 2024-03 | 2024 | M03 | 312.332 |
| 2024-04 | 2024 | M04 | 313.548 |
| 2024-05 | 2024 | M05 | 314.069 |
| 2024-06 | 2024 | M06 | 314.175 |
| 2024-07 | 2024 | M07 | 314.54 |
| 2024-08 | 2024 | M08 | 314.796 |
| 2024-09 | 2024 | M09 | 315.301 |
| 2024-10 | 2024 | M10 | 315.664 |
| 2024-11 | 2024 | M11 | 315.493 |
| 2024-12 | 2024 | M12 | 315.605 |
| 2025-01 | 2025 | M01 | 317.671 |
| 2025-02 | 2025 | M02 | 319.082 |
| 2025-03 | 2025 | M03 | 319.799 |
| 2025-04 | 2025 | M04 | 320.795 |
| 2025-05 | 2025 | M05 | 321.465 |
| 2025-06 | 2025 | M06 | 322.561 |
| 2025-07 | 2025 | M07 | 323.048 |
| 2025-08 | 2025 | M08 | 323.976 |
| 2025-09 | 2025 | M09 | 324.8 |
| 2025-11 | 2025 | M11 | 324.122 |
| 2025-12 | 2025 | M12 | 324.054 |
| 2026-01 | 2026 | M01 | 325.252 |
| 2026-02 | 2026 | M02 | 326.785 |
| 2026-03 | 2026 | M03 | 330.213 |
| 2026-04 | 2026 | M04 | 333.02 |
| 2026-05 | 2026 | M05 | 335.123 |
| 2026-06 | 2026 | M06 | 333.952 |
| 2026-07 | 2026 | M07 | 333.918 |
Purchasing power decision engine
Decision snapshot (server-rendered)
Baseline: HUD Median Family Income adjusted from 2025-07 to 2026-07 using embedded CPI-U monthly series.
- Adjusted income is near the local median and/or purchasing power decreased materially.
- This suggests moderate affordability risk under CPI-U adjustment assumptions.
Purchasing power decision tool (CPI-U monthly)
This module converts an annual income from 2025-07 into its 2026-07 equivalent using the CPI-U series, then compares it to the HUD Median Family Income for Harris County, GA.
The baseline is HUD's Median Family Income for the HUD area, not a Census median household income. The CPI-U series is the official BLS CUUR0000SA0 index, unadjusted; months BLS did not publish are left out rather than interpolated.
HUD Median Family Income (annual): $85,800
Decision output
- Adjusted income is near the local median and/or purchasing power decreased materially.
- This suggests moderate affordability risk under CPI-U adjustment assumptions.
Methodology & assumptions (v1.0)
Adjusted income is computed as Income × CPI(to) / CPI(from) using CPI-U monthly index values embedded in this page.
- CPI-U is an aggregate price index for urban consumers; individual consumption patterns may differ.
- No interpolation is applied; both selected months must exist in the dataset.
- HUD Median Family Income is treated as the annual reference benchmark for the applicable HUD area, compared to adjusted annual income.
- This module performs a historical transformation, not a forecast.
IRS reference
Publication 15-T (2026) — Federal Income Tax Withholding Methods. Official IRS publication →
Reference only. GovCalculator does not compute federal income tax withholding. The publication's withholding methods and tables are not ingested or modelled here.
Sources & methodology
HUD income limits and Fair Market Rents are taken from the fiscal-year tables HUD publishes per HUD-defined area — which can include more than one county — and joined to this county record. State comparisons are computed across the 2BR Fair Market Rents of the county records in the same state; the median uses the middle value and is not weighted by households or population, rank 1 is the highest rent in the state, and county records with identical rents share a rank.
The income figure used throughout this page is HUD's Median Family Income for the HUD area above. It is not a Census median household income and the two are not interchangeable.
The CPI-U series is the official BLS CUUR0000SA0 index, not seasonally adjusted, taken from the published BLS series: 36 published monthly observations. Months BLS did not publish are not interpolated. IRS Publication 15-T is cited as an official reference only — no federal withholding is calculated anywhere on this site.
Verify eligibility requirements with local program administrators: household size, deductions, and program-specific definitions can materially change outcomes.
FAQ
Which HUD area do the figures for Harris County, GA come from?
HUD assigns this county to the Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area area (code METRO17980M17980). A HUD area can cover more than one county, so the area name is not always identical to the county name.
Which fiscal years are shown on this page?
Income limits are FY2026 and Fair Market Rents are FY2026.
What is the Fair Market Rent (2BR) here?
The two-bedroom Fair Market Rent is $1,088 per month. Fair Market Rents for studio through four-bedroom units are listed in the bedroom table above.
Do the income limits on this page decide whether I qualify?
No. They are the thresholds HUD publishes for this area. Programs apply their own rules, and adjusted-income definitions — deductions, allowances, and which household members count — can change the outcome for a given household.
What does the FMR-to-median-family-income share mean?
It is the annualized two-bedroom Fair Market Rent divided by HUD Median Family Income for the same area, here 15.2%. Both inputs are HUD area benchmarks, so it is not a measured rent burden and not an affordability determination.
How does Harris County rank within GA?
Its applicable two-bedroom Fair Market Rent is tied at rank 74 of 159 county records in GA, shared with 4 other county records at the same rent. Rank 1 is the highest rent in the state and county records with identical rents share a rank. That places it approximately at the state median.
Is the CPI-based purchasing power module a forecast?
No. It is a historical adjustment using CPI-U monthly index values: Adjusted = Income × CPI(to) / CPI(from). It does not predict future inflation.
Does this page calculate federal income tax withholding?
No. GovCalculator does not compute federal withholding anywhere. IRS Publication 15-T is cited as an official reference only; its withholding methods and tables are not ingested or modelled here.
Sumter County has the same $1,088 rent. Does it have the same income limits?
No. Sumter County is its own single-county HUD area and its HUD Median Family Income is $52,800, against $85,800 here, so every income limit on this page differs from Sumter's. Two records can share a Fair Market Rent without sharing a HUD area, and the income limits follow the area, not the rent.
Why does an Alabama county appear in this page's HUD area?
The Columbus, GA-AL HUD Metro FMR Area is defined across the state line and includes Russell County, Alabama alongside Chattahoochee, Harris, Marion and Muscogee counties in Georgia. HUD publishes one set of Fair Market Rents and income limits for the whole area, so Russell County's figures are identical to those on this page even though its position within Alabama is very different.
Which agency administers Housing Choice Vouchers for a Harris County household?
The Georgia Department of Community Affairs administers the Housing Choice Voucher program in 149 of Georgia's 159 counties; the remaining 10 are served by their own county housing authority (dca.georgia.gov, accessed 19 August 2026). DCA does not publish the list of ten on that page, so confirm with DCA or with the county before assuming which applies. Either way the administering agency's jurisdiction is a different map from the HUD area whose figures this page publishes.
Disclaimer: Estimates are informational and may not reflect every program rule or household adjustment. Always consult official guidance for Harris County, GA.