Are the Great Smoky Mountains waning as a top tourist destination? Probably not; their namesake public lands have been the most heavily visited U.S. national park for more than a decade. But a Social Explorer analysis of 2015-19 American Community Survey data finds that seasonal homes are making up a smaller percentage of vacancies in two of the three Tennessee counties that host the park, including tourist magnet Sevier County. Seasonal homes in Sevier went from making up 63.6 percent of vacancies in 2009 to barely 58 percent in 2019.

The second home market is a bit brighter on the other side of the border; seasonal homes jumped from 58 percent to 61 percent of vacancies over the decade in Haywood County, N.C., and from 60.7 percent to 78 percent in Swaim County, N.C. Use Social Explorer’s intuitive report-building and mapping tools to judge the strength of the second-home market in your county.

Seasonal Homes, 2019. Click here to explore further.

Author: Frank Bass