Some people are hesitant to commit to homeownership for fear of being tethered to one place. If you’re offered a great job in a new city, taking it becomes harder if you own a home you then need to figure out what to do with.
If you’re a Nashville homeowner who’s moved to Phoenix for work, you have two options for your current house: sell it or rent it out. Selling might be appealing if the market is strong. However, if the market isn’t robust, it’s not necessarily the best option. If you’ve been trying to sell unsuccessfully for 8 months and have already lowered your asking price by $25,000, you may be growing frustrated.
If lowering the price further leads you to become underwater on your mortgage, meaning your home is worth less than your mortgage balance, selling may not be an option unless you’re willing to cover the difference or you can get your lender to agree to selling it for less than the loan balance, a short sale, which will go on your credit report — and potentially cause quite a bit of damage to your credit score [1].
The alternative is keeping the house, renting it out and using that money to pay the mortgage. This, too, can appear an appealing option, particularly if you are struggling to sell at a desired price. However, there are costs and risks involved, so it’s important to weigh your options carefully.
According to Zillow, home values across the U.S. are up 0.3% over the past year, and it takes an average of 20 days for sellers to find an acceptable offer [2]. However, some markets are slowing down — and Nashville is one of them.
Realtor.com reports that Nashville saw the steepest decline in sales activity among the metro areas it looked at in June 2025 [3]. The typical Nashville home sat on the market without a sale for a median number of 52 days, which is 20 days longer than the prior year.
Zillow, meanwhile, says the average home value in Nashville is $436,951, which is 1.4% less than a year ago [4].
The upside of selling your home in this situation is having peace of mind that you’re no longer bearing the costs associated with owning it, such as maintenance, property taxes and insurance. It also means you won’t be paying a mortgage on your Nashville property plus rent or a mortgage in Phoenix at the same time.
The downside is that because it’s not a seller’s market in Nashville, you might end up with a much lower price for your home than you’re happy with. And if you have to lower your price so much that you won’t be able to pay off your mortgage with the sale proceeds, you could end up having to dip into your savings to pay your lender the difference or dealing with the repercussions of a short sale.
If it’s not a good time to sell your Nashville home, renting it out may be a good option, especially if you can command enough rent to cover (or mostly cover) your mortgage, property taxes, insurance and upkeep. Zillow puts the average rent in Nashville at $2,250 per month [5]. Whether your home can command that rent depends on its location, size and features — a local real estate agent could help give you a more precise answer.
If you’re able to get enough to cover your ownership costs, you can ride out a slow market and see if home prices pick up. The Federal Reserve recently made its first interest rate cut of the year, and signaled there could be more cuts to come. Mortgage rate cuts could see buyer demand increase, potentially allowing you to sell your home at a higher price.
On the flipside, renting out your home may not bring in enough income to cover your costs. Don’t forget that in addition to known expenses, such as your mortgage and property taxes, there are unknown expenses, like repairs, to think about. This risk increases with older homes and appliances.
Also, you never know if a tenant might cause damage to your home. And while you can mitigate that risk by collecting a security deposit, it may not be enough. If your end goal is to sell the house, you may not want someone you don’t really know living in it, especially with you being in another city far away.
In fact, if your home is in Nashville and you’re in Phoenix, you’ll likely need to hire a property manager to oversee your home if you decide to rent it out. TenantCloud says property managers typically charge 8% to 12% of the monthly rental value of a home. And some also charge that monthly fee when a home sits unoccupied [6]. So, when you run your numbers, you might need to account for that cost too.
This is not an easy decision to make. To figure out what to do, consider asking yourself the following:
If you’ve already lowered your asking price, you may be loath to do it again. But if knocking a little more money off the price gets it sold, and you can either cover your mortgage balance with your sale proceeds or dip into savings to make up the difference, then that allows you to move forward without the stress of keeping the home.
Similarly, you’ll need to think about how stressful you’ll find the process of renting your home. Some people may not mind this arrangement. And if the rent you’re able to collect well exceeds your homeownership expenses, you can wait out a slow market and pocket some cash in the process. However, if you think keeping the home and renting it out will cause you to lose sleep, then that’s reason enough to try to sell it. If your current strategy hasn’t worked, in addition to another price reduction, consider:
Restaging the home to attract more buyers.
Offering a concession, like buying down a buyer’s mortgage rate.
Adding buyer perks, such as leaving them furniture.
Switching real estate agents if you’re not locked into a contract.
With any luck, one or more of these tactics will help your home sell if you decide that’s what’s best.
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[1]. Experian. “How does a short sale affect credit?”’
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