Best Places to Buy Rental Property in Tennessee (2026)

Cheap is not the same as high-yield in Tennessee. Dyersburg has the lowest median price on this list at $135,000 and ranks third; Memphis, where a $150,000 home asks $1,390 a month, ranks first at 11.1 percent gross. Second is Loudon: 9.5 percent gross, $310,000 to buy, $2,450 a month to rent. Measured against the whole state, these are cheap markets: a median of $306,000 here against $364,500 statewide. The table shows the 20 highest-yielding markets among 66 Tennessee cities meeting the coverage requirements; the yield range above describes the markets shown. A second table lists four cities with enough closings to price but too few rental listings to rank.

The ranking

Gross yield here is an asking rental yield screen: twelve times the median asking rent over the median closed price, before taxes, insurance, vacancy, management or repairs. Sales use municipal boundaries. Rental listings use the associated city name and may cover a wider postal area. The ratio therefore compares related, but not perfectly matched, market samples, and a home bought at the median price does not necessarily earn the median rent. Confirmed-close medians appear where at least 30 confirmed lease closes were recorded in the window.

City by city

1. Memphis, 11.1 percent gross

Homes in Memphis closed at a median of $150,000 over the last six months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $1,390, a gross yield of 11.1 percent. Houses there closed at about $104 per square foot. The Memphis market page carries the monthly figures.

2. Loudon, 9.5 percent gross

Rent is what puts Loudon second here; on price alone it would sit eleventh of 20. Homes in Loudon closed at a median of $310,000 over the last twelve months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $2,450, a gross yield of 9.5 percent. Houses there closed at about $204 per square foot. Full detail is on the Loudon market page.

3. Dyersburg, 8.9 percent gross

Dyersburg clears the rental bar narrowly, with 83 listings behind its $1,000 median, so its 8.9 percent yield deserves a wider margin of error than the bigger samples here. Homes in Dyersburg closed at a median of $135,000 over the last twelve months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $1,000, a gross yield of 8.9 percent. The Dyersburg market page carries the monthly figures.

4. Lewisburg, 8.7 percent gross

At $247,000 to buy and $1,800 a month to rent, Lewisburg yields 8.7 percent gross on 153 tracked closings. Houses there closed at about $183 per square foot. The Lewisburg market page carries the monthly figures.

5. Bartlett, 7.9 percent gross

Bartlett ranks fifth on yield but only thirteenth on entry price: the $2,130 median asking rent is doing the work, not a cheap purchase. The numbers: $325,000 median closed price across 255 closings, $2,130 median asking rent across 248 listings, 7.9 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $152 per square foot. See the Bartlett page for the property mix and the price band.

6. Cordova, 7.9 percent gross

The numbers: $290,000 median closed price across 599 closings, $1,900 median asking rent across 2,837 listings, 7.9 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $141 per square foot. Full detail is on the Cordova market page.

7. Bristol, 7.6 percent gross

Homes in Bristol closed at a median of $237,000 over the last six months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $1,495, a gross yield of 7.6 percent. Houses there closed at about $158 per square foot. Full detail is on the Bristol market page.

8. Antioch, 7.5 percent gross

Rent is what puts Antioch eighth here; on price alone it would sit fourteenth of 20. At $350,000 to buy and $2,195 a month to rent, Antioch yields 7.5 percent gross on 561 tracked closings. Houses there closed at about $205 per square foot. Full detail is on the Antioch market page.

9. Powell, 7.3 percent gross

Rent is what puts Powell ninth here; on price alone it would sit seventeenth of 20. At $360,000 to buy and $2,180 a month to rent, Powell yields 7.3 percent gross on 303 tracked closings. Houses there closed at about $203 per square foot. The Powell market page carries the monthly figures.

10. Knoxville, 7.1 percent gross

At $319,500 to buy and $1,900 a month to rent, Knoxville yields 7.1 percent gross on 1,713 tracked closings. See the Knoxville page for the property mix and the price band.

11. Dickson, 7.1 percent gross

Homes in Dickson closed at a median of $290,385 over the last six months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $1,725, a gross yield of 7.1 percent. Houses there closed at about $202 per square foot. See the Dickson page for the property mix and the price band.

12. Soddy Daisy, 7.0 percent gross

Only 95 rental listings sit behind Soddy Daisy's $1,750 median; the yield is real but less settled than in cities with hundreds. The numbers: $302,000 median closed price across 185 closings, $1,750 median asking rent across 95 listings, 7.0 percent gross. See the Soddy Daisy page for the property mix and the price band.

13. La Vergne, 6.8 percent gross

The numbers: $358,000 median closed price across 277 closings, $2,035 median asking rent across 1,137 listings, 6.8 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $203 per square foot. The La Vergne market page carries the monthly figures.

14. Lawrenceburg, 6.8 percent gross

Lawrenceburg is cheaper than its yield rank suggests: third on price, fourteenth on yield, because a $220,000 home there rents for only $1,250. The numbers: $220,000 median closed price across 215 closings, $1,250 median asking rent across 79 listings, 6.8 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $140 per square foot. Full detail is on the Lawrenceburg market page.

15. Millington, 6.8 percent gross

A low entry price does not carry Millington far: it is seventh cheapest on this list and fifteenth on yield, with rent of $1,565 against a $277,990 median price. At $277,990 to buy and $1,565 a month to rent, Millington yields 6.8 percent gross on 206 tracked closings. Houses there closed at about $173 per square foot. See the Millington page for the property mix and the price band.

16. Old Hickory, 6.7 percent gross

At $386,000 to buy and $2,160 a month to rent, Old Hickory yields 6.7 percent gross on 293 tracked closings. See the Old Hickory page for the property mix and the price band.

17. Pigeon Forge, 6.7 percent gross

The numbers: $465,000 median closed price across 315 closings, $2,600 median asking rent across 107 listings, 6.7 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $350 per square foot. See the Pigeon Forge page for the property mix and the price band.

18. Madison, 6.7 percent gross

The numbers: $354,000 median closed price across 269 closings, $1,975 median asking rent across 683 listings, 6.7 percent gross. Houses there closed at about $218 per square foot. See the Madison page for the property mix and the price band.

19. Germantown, 6.6 percent gross

The numbers: $492,500 median closed price across 424 closings, $2,695 median asking rent across 307 listings, 6.6 percent gross. The Germantown market page carries the monthly figures.

20. Elizabethton, 6.5 percent gross

A low entry price does not carry Elizabethton far: it is fifth cheapest on this list and twentieth on yield, with rent of $1,300 against a $239,900 median price. Homes in Elizabethton closed at a median of $239,900 over the last twelve months and the median asking rent in the last twelve months was $1,300, a gross yield of 6.5 percent. See the Elizabethton page for the property mix and the price band.

Priced, but too few rentals to rank

Resideline can price these cities but cannot yet rank them on rent: each has 100 or more closings and fewer than 50 rental listings in the window.

How this ranking is built

• •Cities: every Tennessee city where Resideline tracked at least 100 closings inside the municipal boundary in its reporting window (six or twelve months) and at least 50 rental listings under the city's name since October 3, 2025: 66 cities qualify and the table shows the 20 highest-yielding.
• •Prices: the median price homes closed at inside the city limits, from Resideline's tracked closings; the state comparison uses the statewide median of $364,500 across 65,407 closings.
• •Rents: the median advertised rent on rental listings Resideline tracked in the last twelve months, all property types, measured on the listings that carry the city's name (a postal footprint, wider than the city line in some places).
• •Confirmed-close medians: Observed rent blends two kinds of record: confirmed lease closes extracted from property records, and the final asking rent on listings that left Resideline tracking without a recorded close. Where a city has at least 30 confirmed closes in the window, their median is printed beside the asking figure; in the last twelve months about a quarter of Resideline's close episodes are confirmed closes. The asking and confirmed-close samples are separate, not paired, so a difference between their medians is not a measured gap on the same listings.
• •What is missing: taxes, insurance, vacancy, management and repairs, which turn a gross yield into a net one, and the unit mix, which differs between what sells and what rents.

Sources and related pages

• •Resideline tracked closings inside city limits (window per city, updated October 4, 2026) and rental listings since October 3, 2025; confirmed lease closes extracted from property records.
• •More Tennessee rankings: Cheapest cities to buy a house in Tennessee ranks the same kind of list with each city's price per square foot for houses, realized appreciation and days to contract beside the median, and Cap Rate by City ranks the Tennessee cities Resideline tracks by gross rental yield. The Tennessee housing market hub carries the statewide figures and the largest Tennessee markets by closings.
• •Asking rent vs observed rent compares live asking rents with final asking rents under that study's own definition; it says nothing about confirmed lease closes.

Prepared with Resideline's research pipeline and reviewed by Jeffrey Batista, Resideline's founder.