“It’s affecting us personally but then I think about how we were a junior enlisted family at one point. I cannot imagine the struggles (they) are going through.”
On-base housing wasn’t an option — the waitlist for a four-bedroom home in the neighborhoods they qualified for was 14 to 16 months.
More than 30 rental applications later and hundreds of dollars in application fees down the drain, the Martins finally found a home. Housing has long been a major benefit for service members, a subsidy to salaries that trail the private sector. But amid record-breaking spikes in rent, the Department of Defense has neglected its commitment to help military families find affordable places to live, service members and housing activists say.
Reports of the housing squeeze that military families are feeling has alarmed members of Congress who are pushing legislation that would force the Department of Defense to rethink how it handles housing. Needham argues the discrepancy between military housing allowances and the current market should alarm officials who are already struggling to recruit the next generation.The Department of Defense did not comment on whether housing issues have become a retention concern. But defense officials said military housing offices monitor markets and offer tools to help families find “suitable, affordable housing, whether on or off-base.
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