Pay, pay raises, pay allowances, pay charts - Air Force Times

Basic Allowance for Housing

Basic Allowance for Housing is the modern version of a military program dating from 1878 under which service members are provided government quarters or a cash substitute when quarters are unavailable. About 950,000 service members stationed in the U.S. receive BAH.

As with most other forms of military pay, BAH, which is not taxable, increases with rank, location and whether a person has dependents.

On Jan. 1, overall BAH rates increased by an average of 3.5 percent, although rates for individual locations can move up or down depending on local rental costs.

However, under a program called “individual rate protection,” service members who arrive at a duty station and begin receiving the current BAH rate will continue to get that rate for as long as they remain at that location, even if rental housing costs (and BAH rates) decline in subsequent years. Newly arriving service members would get the lower BAH rates, on the assumption that they could find suitable housing at less cost.

However, if BAH rates rise in a given location from one year to the next, everyone at that location gets the higher rates.

Until 2006, the BAH program expected service members to pay at least some of their off-base housing costs out of their own pockets. That supposedly ended with the completion of a five-year BAH improvement program that raised payment rates to a level that theoretically covers 100 percent of average rental costs in every location.

The operative word there is average. Service members still may pay some costs out of pocket if they want more housing than the Defense Department deems necessary for someone of their rank and family status.

Under these standards, BAH rates for most enlisted personnel are based on surveys of rental costs for various configurations of apartments, duplexes and townhomes. Only E-9s, the highest enlisted paygrade, receive BAH based on the cost of renting detached single-family homes.

Junior officers also are assumed to be living in townhomes or apartments, and their BAH rates are set accordingly.

What this means is that any enlisted member or junior officer who wants a single-family home likely will have to pay part of the cost out of pocket.

BAH rates are set for more than 370 locations, based on surveys of actual rental costs conducted by Runzheimer International under a Defense Department contract.

Two BAH rates are set for each location:

With-dependent rate. This is paid to personnel with at least one family member who meets the official definition of a dependent. The allowance does not increase for additional family members.

Without-dependent rate. This rate is for single people with no family members living with them.

If a husband and wife both are on active duty and have a child, the higher-ranking spouse gets BAH at the “with-dependent” rate and the other receives it at the “without-dependent” rate. In dual-military couples without children, the husband and wife both receive BAH at the without-dependent rate.

BAH Reserve Component/Transient. BAH RC/T is a new name for what was formerly known as BAH Type II. It is essentially what used to be the Basic Allowance for Quarters, the forerunner of BAH.

BAH RC/T does not vary by location like regular BAH, but it does vary by paygrade and family status. It is a housing allowance for members in particular circumstances, such as troops in transit from overseas and reservists on active duty for less than 30 days — for their annual two-week training stint, for example.

A change in BAH for reservists took effect in 2006. Previously, reservists had to serve on active duty for 140 days or more to qualify for full BAH; any lesser period of mobilization qualified them only for reduced BAH RC/T payments. Reservists now qualify for full BAH when they are mobilized for more than 30 days.

Reservists mobilized for 30 days or less specifically in support of a contingency operation also get full BAH. They receive 1/30th of their normal full BAH rate for each day on active duty.

BAH differential. Some single personnel living on base may qualify for this allowance, which varies by paygrade and goes to those who pay child support. The monthly range is $94.20 to $283.50. To qualify for this payment, the amount of child support paid must be equal to or greater than the BAH differential rate for a member’s paygrade.

Partial BAH. This is paid to personnel who live in barracks or bachelor quarters. Rates are based on rank and range from $6.90 a month for an E-1 to $50.70 for flag officers. Rates for 2006 are the same as for 2004 and 2005.