The 10 Cheapest Places To Live In Tennessee For 2022

The 10 Cheapest Places To Live In Tennessee For 2022

Our tour of Tennessee’s most affordable places takes us to Milan, a city of 7,642 located 25 miles north of Jackson. Milan is known for its innovations in farming, which are on full display at the West Tennessee Agricultural Museum.

These days, though, Milan has a much more diverse economy. Milan’s downtown is a mix of locally-owned boutiques and shops and national chains, and has received awards for its development and upkeep. There’s also the relatively new tradition of the Fall Festival, complete with food trucks, live entertainment, games, and shopping.

The overall cost of living in Milan is about 16% lower than the national average, but in terms of housing, it’s much cheaper. Homes in Milan have a median price of $101,600, up 5% from last year. Milan’s median household income is also up 5% from last year to $43,300.

If you want to give Milan a try before committing to a mortgage, the barrier to entry is incredibly low; the median rent here is just $656.

Henderson is a city of 6,323 located a half-hour southeast of Jackson. Freed-Hartman University is an anchor of the Henderson community, with about 2,000 students in total.

The median rent in Henderson is $712, while a home will only set you back around $95,200. Not too shabby for a median household income of $42,722.

Nature-lovers don’t have to spend a dime to have a good time in Henderson because the gorgeous Chickasaw State Park is right in your backyard. Besides hiking and camping, you can also rent rowboats and pedal boats for the charming Lake Placid.

Henderson is also incredibly safe, with an overall crime rate 30% below the statewide average. Additionally, the cost of living in Henderson is cheap, with housing costs 21% lower than your typical Tennessee city.

Church Hill is a city in Hawkins County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 5,916 at the 2000 census and 6,737 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Kingsport-Bristol -Bristol Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is a component of the Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA Combined Statistical Area – commonly known as the “Tri-Cities” region.

Mount Carmel is a town located in Hawkins County, Tennessee. As of the 2010 Census, the population was 5,429, an increase of 634 since the 2000 census. It is part of the Kingsport-Bristol -Bristol Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is a component of the Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA Combined Statistical Area – commonly known as the “Tri-Cities” region.

Harriman is a city located primarily in Roane County, Tennessee, with a small extension into Morgan County. The population of Harriman was 6,350 at the 2010 census.

LaFollette is a city in Campbell County, Tennessee, United States. Its population was 7,456 at the 2010 census, with an estimated population in 2014 of 7,131. It is the principal city of the LaFollette, Tennessee Micropolitan Statistical Area, which includes all of Campbell County, and is a component of the Knoxville-Sevierville-La Follette Combined Statistical Area. While the city’s official spelling is one word -after its founders, Harvey Marion LaFollette and his younger brother Grant LaFollette-several federal agencies spell the city’s name with two words.

Pulaski is a city and county seat of Giles County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 7,870 at the 2010 census.It was named to honor the Polish-born American Revolutionary War hero Kazimierz Puaski. It is home to Martin Methodist College.

Brownsville is a city in Haywood County, Tennessee. It is the county seat of Haywood County, which is in the broad delta floodplain near the Mississippi River. Its population as of the 2010 census is 10,292.

If you’ve ever been to the Bonnaroo Music Festival, you know that there are many reasons to pack up a moving truck and move to Manchester in Coffee County.

However, we think that the main reason that you should move to Tennessee’s ninth least expensive city is that the median income here is $49,389 making it the 24th most affordable place to buy a home.

Is there anything Atoka can’t do? We already named this charming little town one of the best Memphis suburbs, as well as one of the safest places in Tennessee.

The fact that Atoka is also mega-affordable is just icing on the cake as far as we’re concerned. While housing costs are slightly higher than other places listed here, Atoka makes up for it with a high median income of $86,935 and super-low rates of unemployment and poverty. Not to mention that Atoka has some of the best schools around, with GreatSchools awarding the town an 8/10 score.

Besides that, Atoka has five great parks, several seasonal events, and a young, rapidly growing population.

The cost of living in Atoka is 9% lower than the national average, with things like groceries, healthcare, and services standing out as extra-cheap. Homes in Atoka sell for a median price of $206,500, while rent goes for around $1,180.

Cheapest Places To Live In Tennessee FAQs

What county in Tennessee has the lowest cost of living?

The county in Tennessee with the lowest cost of living is Carroll County. The average living wage in Carroll County is $73,333 according to MIT data. Carroll County has the lowest cost of living because it has relatively less expensive childcare and housing costs compared to Tennessee as a whole. Childcare costs $10,572 a year in Carroll County for two children compared to the Tennessee average of $12,473. Housing costs, defined as a blend of the average rent and average mortgage payment, are $7,956 per year in Carroll County compared to $10,853 on average in Tennessee.

What is the cost of living in Tennessee?

The cost of living in Tennessee is 12.2% lower than the US average. According to MIT, the required living wage for a family of four with two working parents in Tennessee is $78,800 vs the national average for a family of four with two working parents of $89,744. The median income of a Tennessee household is $54,833.

What is the cheapest housing market in Tennessee?

The cheapest housing market in Tennessee is Humboldt. The average home value in Humboldt is $84,600, the lowest in the state. The average home value in Tennessee is $177,600, almost 2.1 times higher than Humboldt.

Methodology: How We Determined The Most Affordable Places To Live In The Volunteer State For 2022

The two most important things to think about when it comes to being able to afford if you can live comes down to:

1. How much do money do I make?
2. How much do I have spend to live there?

You need to understand your costs in the context of how much money you make.

For example, if the median household earns $100,000 and spends $40,000 on housing it’s actually cheaper to live there than a place with a median income of $50,000 and housing costs of $21,000. You might spend more on housing, but you have more money overall to play with.

With that example in mind, we derived several statistics from the latest Census American Community Survey 2016-2020 around incomes and costs. They are:

• Median Home Price / Median Income (lower is better)
• Median Income / Median Rent (Higher is better)
• Median Home Price

We added simply median home price because high home prices generally correlate with higher expenses for all costs related to homes (heating, electricity, etc).

You can then compare these metrics in each of the places in Tennessee to figure out which is the least expensive.

What you are left with is a “Cost of Living Index” by taking the average rank of each of these metrics for each city.

So we used that cost of living index in order to rank all of the 97 places in Tennessee that have more than 5,000 people.

The place with the lowest cost of living in Tennessee according to the data is Milan. You can download the data here.