Market screen · county data · updated October 18, 2026

Knoxville, TN: a typical house comes in at 0.81x; houses under about $192,500 clear 1.20x

At the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent ($1,419 a month), a house at the area's typical value ($295,300) has a full monthly payment of $1,758: principal and interest on a 75% loan at 7.5% over 30 years, plus property tax and insurance. The rent covers 0.81x of it. At the 3-bedroom figure ($1,785) it would be 1.02x. Run the house you are looking at on its own rent.

The numbers

Typical home value

$295,300

County medians weighted by households (Census ACS).

Rent: HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent

$1,419

A government floor, not a house rent.

Rent: HUD 3-bedroom Fair Market Rent

$1,785

The high end of the range.

Payment that clears 1.20x

$1,183

Rent ÷ 1.20, taxes and insurance included.

Price that clears 1.20x

$192,500

At this rent, 25% down, 7.5%, 30 years.

Rent-to-price

5.8%

A year of rent over the typical value.

Effective property tax

0.44%

Median tax over median value, owner-occupied homes (Census ACS); a rental can be taxed higher.

Insurance, median

$1,200 a year

What owners report paying (Census ACS); a landlord policy can differ.

Rental vacancy

4.8%

Unemployment

3.3%

Jobs down 1.6% over a year (federal labor statistics).

New homes permitted

20.8 per 1,000 households

Census Building Permits, latest year.

Flood insurance claims

396

NFIP claims since 2005 across the area's counties.

The typical house, worked out

Price$295,300
Loan (75%)$221,475
Principal and interest (7.5%, 30 years)$1,549
Property tax$109
Insurance$100
Full monthly payment$1,758
Rent (HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent)$1,419
DSCR: rent ÷ full payment0.81x

DSCR is the monthly rent divided by the full monthly payment. We use 1.20x as a cushion; many DSCR lenders accept as low as 1.00x. A lender sizes the loan on the lease or the appraiser's rent estimate for the specific house, often the lower of the two, not on an area figure.

The 9 counties in this area

  • Knox County, TN201,146 households
  • Blount County, TN55,522 households
  • Anderson County, TN32,755 households
  • Loudon County, TN24,056 households
  • Roane County, TN22,790 households
  • Campbell County, TN17,186 households
  • Grainger County, TN9,660 households
  • Union County, TN7,931 households
  • Morgan County, TN7,188 households

How this screen is made

A market screen is built from official county data only: the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent and its 3-bedroom figure, Census household-survey values, taxes, insurance and vacancy, Census building permits, federal unemployment statistics and NFIP flood claims. It updates when those sources do. Owner-occupied homes can carry a homestead exemption or assessment cap that a rental does not get, so a rental's tax can run higher, notably in states such as Florida and Texas. It carries no monthly interpretation; markets with a monthly hub get that on their own page. The rent is the HUD 2-bedroom Fair Market Rent, which can sit below what a single-family house rents for, so the ratio here is cautious.