Every travel nursing contract funds your housing one of two ways. Either the agency signs the lease itself and puts you in a furnished apartment, known as company housing, or it adds a monthly housing stipend to your paycheck and leaves the housing search to you. Both options can appear on a pay package as roughly the same dollar value, but they do not produce the same amount of money in your bank account by the end of a 13-week assignment.
The difference is not really about taxes. It is about who captures the gap between what housing actually costs and what the agency is willing to pay for it. Run your own numbers with our per diem checker before comparing offers, because the answer depends on your city and how confident you are in your tax home.
Company Housing vs. a Housing Stipend: What's Actually Different
With company housing, the agency or its housing vendor signs a lease or books a furnished unit and pays the landlord directly. You never see the money; you just move in. There is no housing search to run, but there is also no way to benefit financially if you could have found something cheaper on your own.
With a housing stipend, the agency instead adds a set dollar amount to your pay each week, typically labeled as a non-taxable reimbursement, and you find and pay for your own housing, whether an apartment lease, a sublease, or a documented rent arrangement with family. Whatever you don't spend is yours to keep. See our guide to taxable versus non-taxable travel nurse pay for how stipends show up on a contract next to taxable wages.
Why the Tax Treatment Is (Mostly) the Same
It's easy to assume company housing and a stipend are taxed differently, but the underlying IRS rule is identical for both. Employer-provided lodging and cash reimbursements are excludable from taxable income only if you're traveling away from a genuine tax home, under IRS Publication 463. If you have a qualifying tax home, both can be provided tax-free. If you don't, both are technically taxable compensation, whether the value shows up as a furnished apartment or as cash on a pay stub.
In practice, the two arrangements carry different levels of exposure. Company housing is arranged and paid by the agency, so there's no cash sitting in your account that you might mistakenly treat as free money. A stipend is different: it lands in your bank account labeled non-taxable, and nothing stops you from spending or banking it before anyone verifies you actually had a tax home to justify the exclusion. If you're audited without one, the IRS can reclassify every stipend dollar you were paid as wages, plus penalties and interest, and the burden of proof falls on you.
The Math: When a Stipend Pays More, and When It Doesn't
Here is where the stipend can genuinely outperform company housing. Say your agency offers a $1,800 monthly housing stipend on a 13-week contract. If you move in with a family member and pay documented fair-market rent of $1,200 a month, or land a sublease at that price, you pocket the $600 monthly difference, roughly $1,800 tax-free over the assignment, because your actual cost came in under what the agency budgeted. Company housing worth that same $1,800 a month gives you nowhere to put that gap; you get a place to live and nothing more, even if the unit is objectively worth less than what the agency pays for it.
The risk runs the other way, too. If your actual housing cost matches or exceeds the stipend, which is common in tight markets, you gain nothing extra, and any overage comes straight out of your paycheck with no tax benefit to offset it. Agencies often benchmark stipends against GSA federal per diem rates. For FY2026, the standard CONUS lodging rate is $110 a night, unchanged from FY2025, per GSA's FY2026 per diem bulletin, about $3,300 for a 30-day month at the ceiling, well above what most agencies actually pay, which is why an $1,800 stipend is realistic mid-market pay, not a padded number.
Our per diem checker compares an offered stipend against the GSA benchmark for your assignment city, and our 2026 per diem rate guide walks through how those city-by-city benchmarks work. Stipends are also typically prorated for call-offs and missed shifts, a risk company housing doesn't carry; see our breakdown of per diem clawbacks on missed shifts for how that math works.
Which One Should You Choose?
Newer travelers, and anyone who hasn't firmly established a tax home yet, generally do better with company housing. It removes the housing search entirely and doesn't require you to manage a cash windfall whose tax-free status hinges on a tax home determination you may not have nailed down. There's no upside to give up if you're not yet positioned to capture it safely.
Travelers with a confirmed, well-documented tax home and some flexibility in where they land, such as a spare room with family, a roommate split, or a landlord willing to negotiate a short sublease, are better positioned to take the stipend and bank the difference. Before committing to either structure, run the full contract, wages and housing included, through our contract analyzer to compare the effective hourly rate each option actually produces once taxes and housing costs are factored in.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is company housing taxable if I don't have a tax home?
Yes, in principle. The value of employer-provided lodging is only tax-free if you're away from a genuine tax home. Without one, the IRS considers you itinerant, and the fair-market value of that housing is treated as additional taxable compensation, the same as an unjustified stipend would be.
Can I ask my agency for a stipend instead of company housing, or vice versa?
Most agencies will let you choose, especially larger ones with established housing vendors. Ask during contract negotiation, before you sign; switching structures mid-assignment is harder and often means renegotiating the whole pay package.
What happens if my actual rent is higher than my stipend?
You cover the difference out of pocket, with no special tax treatment for the shortfall. This is the core risk of a stipend in an expensive or fast-moving market. Company housing avoids this problem because the agency absorbs cost overruns on its end.
Does the IRS require receipts to prove a housing stipend was reasonable?
Amounts at or below the GSA per diem rate for the assignment location are generally treated as substantiated without itemized receipts, but you still need to prove you had a qualifying tax home in the first place. That's a separate requirement from proving how the money was spent.
Which option is better for a first-time traveler?
Company housing is usually the safer starting point. It eliminates the housing search in an unfamiliar city and doesn't tie your take-home pay to a tax home status you may still be establishing. Many travelers switch to stipends once they've completed a contract or two and have documentation to support their tax home.
Disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes only and is not tax or legal advice. Tax home determinations depend on individual facts and circumstances. Consult a CPA or enrolled agent who specializes in travel healthcare taxation before making decisions about your tax home status.