Based on the data of China Household Finance Survey (CHFS) in 2017, the empirical study finds that the rental consumption of the participants in the housing provident fund (HPF) system is significantly higher than that of those nonparticipants. After alleviating the potential endogenous bias, this conclusion still holds. We further find that participation in the HPF can boost the rental consumption of the participants especially for those with high-income, stable employment and highranked jobs. The results show that, on the one hand, we should actively use the boosting effect of the HPF system on rental housing consumption to support the development of the rental housing market, and pay attention to expanding the benefit coverage of HPF to support rental consumption. On the other hand, we should make the policy more precise to prevent the differentiation of tenants paying power due to the subsidy effect of HPF.