Johnson City, Tennessee.
Typical home $292,890 (+1.4% in a year), asking rent $1,507 (+2.9%). Johnson City, TN metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$895 (+139%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Up $4,129 +1%
- $288,761$292,890 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $68,327 +30%
- $224,563$292,890 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.
- Johnson City$1,537
- Tennessee$1,737
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 13 years.
Typical home values in Johnson City, TN rose 1.4% over the past year — faster than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Johnson City, TN rose 2.9% over the past year — in step with the nation.
Owning the typical home in Johnson City runs $472/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $641 in Oct 2023.
That is $1,978 a month against $1,507 rent: a $1,537 mortgage payment, plus $128 property tax and $314 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Johnson City
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$1,978
- Renting$1,507
- Mortgage only$1,537
Property tax · $128/mo 0.52% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Washington County, TN
Insurance & upkeep · $314/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 Johnson City, Washington County, Tennessee
Johnson City is a city of 71,046 people in Washington County. Half its households earn more than $57,254 a year and half less, against $62,809 across Washington County; 20% of its people live below the poverty line. 51% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 49% are rented. Unemployment in Johnson City was 3.4% in August 2026, and Washington County had 0.7% fewer jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
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. Johnson City is a city in Washington County, Tennessee, home to a population on the younger side, and a good share of adults hold a four-year degree. Incomes run below the county's, and more people here live below the poverty line than most would expect to find. Fewer homes are lived in by their owners than across much of the country, with renting common, and winters are cool with only a little snow, while summers turn warm and the year brings plenty of rain.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, with shops, restaurants and hotels, and manufacturing also employing a good number. Among the largest workplaces in Johnson City are the Veterans Health Administration, Johnson City Medical Center and Johnson City Schools. Commutes are fairly short, and some people work from home.
Things to do. Boone Lake is a reservoir a short drive away, and the Watauga River, also a short drive away, offers another stretch of water. For some local history, Fort Watauga is a fort a short drive from town. Bristol Motor Speedway, a race track, is a longer drive away.
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- 30,662households
- 42%of adults have a degree
- 20%below the poverty line
- 19 mintypical commute
- 12%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Washington County had 63,282 jobs in 2025, 0.7% fewer than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 46° and lows near 26°; warmest in July, with highs near 86° and lows near 64°. About 6 inches of snow and 48 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Elizabethton weather station, 7 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Johnson City
- Veterans Health AdministrationFederal government · Department of Veterans Affairs2,610
- Johnson City Medical CenterGeneral hospital1,993FTE
- Johnson City SchoolsSchool district1,352FTE
- AO Smith Fairview AveHot water heaters, household-type, manufacturing995
- Crown Laboratories PlantPharmaceutical manufacturing425
- Franklin Woods Community HospitalGeneral hospital364FTE
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters363
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters354
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 87 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 11,829 people in all. Federal offices come from OPM's federal workforce data (2026), hospitals from their Medicare cost reports (CMS, 2023) and school districts 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
- LightningRelatively high
- Strong windrelatively high in parts of Johnson CityRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Johnson City’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, very 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 Washington County and the Johnson City, TN metro.
Johnson City home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Johnson City$292,890
- Tennessee$330,844
- 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 Johnson City listings, and the typical home goes pending in 22 days — 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.
- Johnson City36.45%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Johnson City22
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Johnson City376
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Johnson City114
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Johnson City$310,687
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Johnson City97.67%
Zip codes with a Johnson City address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Johnson City — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Johnson 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 37604 | Johnson City | 39,097 | $1,565 | $282,552 |
| 37601 | Johnson City | 38,008 | $1,266 | $262,775 |
| 37615 | Johnson City | 22,821 | $1,698 | $352,311 |