02-05-2025
Report details changes in Johnson City housing
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (WJHL) – Thursday morning, the City of Johnson City released its 2025 Housing Needs Assessment. The report analyzes certain trends and conditions to predict changes in housing needs in the next few years.
The last housing assessment took place in 2023.
Lexi Vance, Johnson City's economic development specialist, said there were many factors leading up to the decision to have an assessment.
'Around 2020, we saw a little bit of a spike in population and then we started seeing all these accolades roll in for Johnson City about us being a great place to live and then we also start seeing national headlines about a national housing affordability crisis,' Vance said.
Vance said the report led to the city wondering where people were going to live.
The 2023 housing assessment showed a housing gap of under 5,000 units. Back in January, the city decided to do another assessment to see if that number had changed. They found the gap had increased by almost 600 units.
'If you have children, if you have students you really like, if you have employees you really, like that may be younger, you want to keep them, and if there's nowhere for them to live, we risk losing them to other communities,' Vance said.
Vance said the report also analyzes housing prices. She compared the findings in the 2023 and 2025 reports.
'For a single-family home, that actually fell by about $40,000, which we thought that was great news,' she said.
Along with housing prices, Vance said there were changes in rent.
'We saw annual rent increases of 12% to 17.5% in that year. Our income went up quite a bit and we also saw more people become house owners or homeowners.'
Vance said the new report will help the city make plans for the future.
'What it means is that we're trying to be smart about how we grow and prepare for a larger and healthy city.'
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