For ministers who receive a housing allowance
Next year’s designation is a guess built on last year’s guess.
It does not have to be. Churches set the housing allowance for 2027 this fall, and most ministers set the number from memory. MHA Tracker is a simple app that logs what you actually spend on housing as you go (rent or mortgage, utilities, furnishings, repairs), so next year’s designation rests on this year’s real total, and April is a matter of printing a record instead of rebuilding one.
What it does
- Keeps housing costs in the categories that matter for a Section 107 exclusion: rent or mortgage, utilities, furnishings, repairs, and fair rental value.
- Holds receipts and notes alongside the amounts, in one place instead of a shoebox and three email threads.
- Produces a year-end summary you can hand to whoever prepares your return.
- Built for one minister's own records. It is not church accounting, and there is no bookkeeping system to learn.
MHA Tracker is record-keeping software. It does not give tax or legal advice. How your allowance is designated, and what you may exclude, are questions for your church board and your tax preparer.
Why you may have heard from me
If you received an email from this domain, it is because you are a pastor, and I built MHA Tracker for people like you. I wrote the email myself, and I found you the way anyone could: through your church's website or your denomination's directory.
I would rather hear from ministers early than guess at what you need. If it is not useful to you, please reply and say so. I will not write again.
Who is building it
I am Paul McWilliams. I grew up a pastor's kid, and for more than a decade I have worked as a financial advisor for pastors, churches, and ministry organizations. The housing allowance comes up constantly, and its burden lands on the minister personally: the tracking, the receipts, and the end-of-year scramble to reconstruct a year of spending. Very little software treats that as its own task, so in 2025 I started building MHA Tracker.
It is in development now, and I am looking for a small number of ministers to try it early and tell me plainly what is missing. Early access is free: you can create an account in about a minute, or read more about the app first at mhatracker.com.
Get in touch
Questions, feedback, or interest in trying it early? Please email me directly. I read and answer every message myself.
Mailing address
Ministerial Housing Allowance Tracker LLCMHA Tracker
PO Box 1445, Kailua, HI 96734
Privacy
This page sets no cookies and runs no tracking or analytics scripts. Nothing about your visit is recorded.
If I wrote to you, my outreach database holds what is described above: your name, title, church, and an email address, gathered from public sources or matched by a lookup service. If you email me, I also keep what you wrote so that I can reply. I do not sell, rent, or share any of it with anyone.
If you ask to be removed, your record is deleted from that database and you will not hear from me again. To see what I have on file for you, or to have it removed, please email paul@trymhatracker.com and I will take care of it. Thanks.
A plain disclaimer
MHA Tracker is record-keeping software. It is not tax, legal, or financial advice, and using it does not create an advisory relationship. Please confirm anything about your own housing allowance with your tax preparer.
Early access
Ready to try it?
Records kept through the year instead of rebuilt in April. Create a free account, log one housing cost, and see whether it fits how you keep records. If it does not, please tell me what is missing. That is exactly what early access is for.