In July, MPHA is launching a new Landlord Excellence Program (LEP) to expand training resources, incentivize high-performing landlords, and more quickly remediate problems with landlords who partner with MPHA to provide homes for individuals and families with a rental subsidy through MPHA’s voucher programs. This new program will ensure landlords meet MPHA’s standards, provide voucher holders additional insight into landlords’ performance, and create greater efficiencies within the agency’s landlord inspection and education work. The program will become effective on July 1, 2026.

“This new Landlord Excellence Program creates a clear methodology for landlords that partner with MPHA to provide the type of quality homes MPHA voucher holders deserve,” said Brandon Crow, Director of Housing Choice Vouchers at the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority. “By providing a clear understanding of MPHA standards and incentivizing landlords who consistently meet or exceed these benchmarks, the program aims streamline MPHA’s reeducation and reinspection work. This new system will also deliver greater transparency to voucher holders, along with identifying landlords who need additional assistance meeting MPHA’s housing standards.”

When a voucher holder chooses a home, the unit must be inspected by a housing authority inspector to confirm the unit meets MPHA’s inspections standards. These standards, based on the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Housing Quality Standards, ensure families are moving into decent, safe, and sanitary rental units.

MPHA regularly performs three types of inspections: initial (done to approve a unit for move-in), annual (done once a year to ensure a unit maintains standards), and interim (at the request of the tenant or the owner for a specific issue). When a unit fails an inspection, landlords have 21-30 days to make repairs before a reinspection is performed. If a unit fails a reinspection, the unit goes into abatement—landlords forfeit funds until stipulated requirements are met. If the unit is not brought up to the standard within the required timeline after the reinspection, MPHA will terminate the contract, and the tenant moves to another unit.

The new LEP will create a tiered system to measure landlords’ performance in meeting MPHA’s Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) department’s inspection standards. The program will classify landlords into gold unit, standard, and remediation tiers based primarily on the inspection pass rates and number of abatements.

The classification is not a reflection of the units’ quality, but rather the landlords’ ability to meet the criteria MPHA sets for maintaining a unit. Landlords who consistently meet or exceed MPHA’s standards will receive an enhanced incentive package, while those who fail to meet standards will receive additional education and assistance. To ensure fairness across different sized landlords, the number of units a landlord owns impacts their required inspection pass rate.

While the existing program incentivized new landlords to work with MPHA, the Landlord Excellence Program incentives all landlords—no matter how long they have worked with MPHA—to ensure the units MPHA voucher holders live in exceed the minimum requirements. The new program also brings process efficiencies for landlords and the agency for high performers. This means MPHA has more time to allocate to education, training, and reinspections for those not meeting the MPHA standards.

Landlords in the gold unit tier qualify for damage claims up to $2,500 beyond the security deposit, don’t require reinspection upon submitting proof of repairs (including photos, invoices, or work orders), and can opt for biennial inspections instead of annual inspections. Landlords that fall into the remediation tier lose out on damage claims, require and are charged for physical reinspection of all failed inspections, and must attend a remediation training.

On July 1, all landlords and property managers that have qualifying active units with MPHA will be assigned a tier based on their inspections and abatements over the last year (July 1, 2025-June 30, 2026). Some units, such as project-based units, will not qualify for the program. Thereafter, annual reviews will be used to determine a landlord’s status based on the number of owned units, inspection pass rates, and number of abatements over the previous 12-month period. Tier movements will only occur at the time of the annual reviews. New landlords will be automatically placed into the standard tier.

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Landlords interested in renting to MPHA voucher holders should email or call MPHA’s Community Engagement Specialist at owners@mplspha.org or (612) 342-1222. Landlords can post properties for free on housinglink.org and can contact owneroutreach@mplspha.org to share property details.