Gate City, Virginia.
Typical home $174,240 (+3.3% in a year). Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$556 (+155%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $5,626 +3%
- $168,613$174,240 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $54,991 +46%
- $119,249$174,240 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.
- Gate City$915
- Virginia$2,164
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 9 years.
Typical home values in Gate City, VA rose 3.3% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Living in Gate City, Scott County, Virginia
Gate City is a town of 2,043 people in Scott County. 70% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 30% are rented. Unemployment in Scott County was 4.1% in August 2026, and the county had 1.0% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then manufacturing.
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 It can be wrong or out of date.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. Gate City is a small town in Scott County in southwest Virginia, and most homes here are lived in by their owners. Poverty is somewhat more common than across the country as a whole, and household incomes across the county run below many parts of the state. Winters are cold, with only a little snow, summers are warm, and rain and melted snow fall steadily through the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with manufacturing, shops, and banks, insurance and property also employing a good number. Scott County Public Schools and Food Lion are among the largest workplaces in town. Across the county there are slightly fewer jobs than a year earlier, and unemployment is a little higher than it was then. Most people travel a moderate distance to work, and few work from home.
Things to do. Natural Tunnel State Park is a protected area a short drive away, and the Holston River, also close by, offers a place to be near the water. The Mountain Music Museum, a short drive away, takes in the musical heritage of the region. For a longer outing, Bristol Motor Speedway is a race track a longer drive away.
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- 886households
- 29%of adults have a degree
- 17%below the poverty line
- 22 mintypical commute
- 6%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Scott County had 4,929 jobs in 2025, 1.0% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 46° and lows near 27°; warmest in July, with highs near 87° and lows near 66°. About 5 inches of snow and 45 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Kingsport weather station, 9 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Gate City
- Scott County Public SchoolsSchool district635FTE
- Food LionGrocery stores35
- Gate CityMail and parcel delivery23
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 2 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 58 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24); 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
- LandslidesRelatively moderate
- Strong windRelatively moderate
- Inland floodingRelatively moderate
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
- LightningRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Gate City’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 Scott County and the Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA metro.
Gate City home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Gate City$174,240
- Virginia$412,252
- United States$366,157
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Gate City listings — the market is roughly in balance.
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.
- Gate City31.23%
- United States26.90%
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Gate City33
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Gate City8
Zip codes with a Gate City address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Gate City — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Gate City
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24251 | Gate City | 7,937 | — | $171,768 |
| 24258 | Hiltons | 1,163 | — | $202,603 |