Chesapeake, Virginia.
Typical home $424,217 (+3.6% in a year), asking rent $2,063 (+6.3%). Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News, VA-NC metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,190 (+115%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $14,657 +4%
- $409,560$424,217 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $90,630 +27%
- $333,587$424,217 since Sep 2021
Monthly payment to buy the typical home
Home value × that month's 30-year mortgage rate, 20% down, principal and interest. This is the line households feel: prices and rates compound each other.
- Chesapeake$2,227
- Virginia$2,164
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 14 years.
Typical home values in Chesapeake, VA rose 3.6% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Chesapeake, VA rose 6.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Chesapeake runs $908/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $1,021 in Oct 2023.
That is $2,971 a month against $2,063 rent: a $2,227 mortgage payment, plus $290 property tax and $454 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Chesapeake
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$2,971
- Renting$2,063
- Mortgage only$2,227
Property tax · $290/mo 0.82% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Chesapeake City, VA
Insurance & upkeep · $454/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Chesapeake, Virginia
Chesapeake is a city of 249,422 people in Chesapeake city. Half its households earn more than $95,373 a year and half less, against $95,373 across Chesapeake city; 9% of its people live below the poverty line. 74% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 26% are rented. Unemployment in Chesapeake was 3.6% in August 2026, and Chesapeake city had 2.7% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then professional services.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 23 October 2026 from the figures here, a list of nearby places and what it knows. It can be wrong or out of date.
What it’s like
The place. Chesapeake is a large Virginia city where most homes are lived in by their owners, and where household incomes are comfortable and fewer people live below the poverty line than in many places. Typical home values and rents run high. Winters are mild and cool rather than harsh, summers are hot, and rain falls through the year with only a little snow.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, in professional and business services, in shops, and in government. The biggest local employers include Chesapeake City Public Schools, Amazon, and Chesapeake General Hospital. Unemployment is low and has barely changed over the past year, and the number of jobs in the city has grown.
Things to do. The Chesapeake Arboretum is a botanical garden a short drive away. A longer drive brings Lake Drummond and Dismal Swamp State Park, both protected wild places, and the Chrysler Museum of Art. The James River is also within reach for time by the water.
Report a mistake
- 93,626households
- 37%of adults have a degree
- 9%below the poverty line
- 26 mintypical commute
- 13%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Chesapeake city had 107,476 jobs in 2025, 2.7% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 54° and lows near 34°; warmest in July, with highs near 92° and lows near 73°. About 49 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Fentress Naas weather station, 9 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Chesapeake
- Chesapeake City Public SchoolsSchool district6,426FTE
- AmazonGeneral warehousing and storage2,616
- Chesapeake General HospitalGeneral hospital1,710FTE
- Chugach Government SolutionsShip repair done in a shipyard790
- ImiaShip repair453
- Oceaneering-Marine Services DivisionShip repair done in a shipyard452
- MEB General ContractorsCommercial building construction general contractors425
- U.s. Coast GuardFederal government · Department of Homeland Security409
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 201 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 23,172 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24), hospitals from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) and federal offices from OPM's federal workforce data (2026); FTE marks full-time equivalent staff. Not listed: many offices and banks, which need not report to OSHA; military bases, whose staff OPM withholds; and, in about half the states, city and county governments.
Natural hazards
- Coastal floodingRelatively moderate
- HurricanesRelatively moderate
- Heat wavesRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Chesapeake’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, relatively low. It is meant for planning, not a substitute for a local risk assessment or a flood map: FEMA’s index.
From the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 census and its American Community Survey (2020–2024 five-year estimates), and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A survey, so each figure has a margin of error, and figures it is not sure of are left out. More on Chesapeake city and the Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News, VA-NC metro.
Chesapeake home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Chesapeake$424,217
- Virginia$412,252
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Chesapeake listings, and the typical home goes pending in 31 days — the market is cooling.
When this market ran hot
Each cell is that month's year-on-year home-value growth. Read left to right, top row is the latest year — the 2021–22 band is the boom.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Share of listings with a price cut
The early-warning dial: sellers cut when buyers stop reaching. Rising cuts cool a market months before prices notice.
- Chesapeake28.99%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Chesapeake31
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Chesapeake976
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Chesapeake337
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Chesapeake$403,361
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Chesapeake100.25%
Zip codes with a Chesapeake address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Chesapeake — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Chesapeake
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23322 | Chesapeake | 66,956 | $2,846 | $551,442 |
| 23320 | Chesapeake | 59,108 | $2,084 | $390,272 |
| 23323 | Chesapeake | 43,043 | $2,299 | $426,206 |
| 23321 | Chesapeake | 40,176 | $1,805 | $403,283 |
| 23324 | Chesapeake | 24,670 | $1,641 | $286,138 |
| 23325 | Chesapeake | 19,138 | $1,864 | $330,329 |