Everyone needs a place to live. Whether you live in an apartment, condo, house, or maybe even a hotel doesn’t matter as long as you have a place to call home. However, recently, it’s been harder to find that place because the prices for rent and housing have skyrocketed. 

Catrina Foster is a realtor who works mainly in Loudon County and Knoxville. She’s seen how the market has changed dramatically since the pandemic.

“With the rising mortgage interest rates, the home buyer that could afford to purchase a $350,000 home at the beginning of the year has been slashed in half. Many apartment complexes range approximately at $1,100 for a 1 bedroom apartment to $1,800 for a 3 bedroom apartment. During the pandemic, we experienced a huge influx of people moving to East Tennessee. For example, between 2020 and 2021, Loudon County experienced approximately a 16.4% increase in population. [During that time], there were often multiple buyers on one property. And, many of the one and two bedroom apartments now have a long waiting list,” Foster said.

This problem mainly affects young adults. Because young adults typically don’t have the money to buy a house, they often end up renting. As discussed earlier, though, the prices of renting have greatly increased, which makes it very hard for young adults to find their own home.

“Several younger clients have either moved back in with their parents in order to save more money for a down payment on a home and/or to pay off or down debt. Some have decided to get roommates in order to keep their monthly rents lower and save more money to purchase a home in the future,” Foster said.

Hopefully, in the future, these prices will eventually come down since prices are mainly based on supply and demand. If the supply/number of houses increase, then the prices will decrease due to decrease in demand. However, it’s up to our county to push for that to happen.

“Loudon County Commision has put a permanent moratorium on the new Planned Unit Developments, which will make it even more difficult to provide housing for those wishing to make their homes in Loudoun County,” Foster said.

If Loudon County can’t construct more housing that our community desperately needs, we might see a lot of young adults decide to move to other places. For example, many young adults are now moving out of Knoxville in order to find homes. Out of the young adults born in Knoxville between 1984-1992, 72% stayed in Knoxville while the other 28% have moved to other areas due to the high price of housing (migrationpatterns.org). 

I’m glad to see my community growing, but part of that growth means having to accommodate for that growth. More affordable housing and rent needs to be available for our ever growing community, especially for our upcoming younger generation.