Southside, Virginia

Southside, Virginia Details

Build a Snowman with Your Children

For families looking to set memories, the area sees lovely snowfall almost every year. Normally, this will be less than 12 inches, but if you choose a region on the northern or western fringe, you could see an annual increase of seven inches more than the rest of the region.

Seeking Higher Education?

The area has 11 established colleges. On the whole, the region has an education rate of 18 percent who earned their bachelor’s degree. If you want to send your son or daughter to one of the schools here, you have many good ones to choose from like:

• St. Paul’s College
• Lynchburg College
• Randolph College
• Averett University
• Liberty University

Employment

This region has long been revered for its abundant tobacco crop. The soil’s rich nutrients and frequent rainfalls have meant you have some of the most ideal conditions to grow tobacco, more than anywhere else in the United States. Other things grown here include cotton plants. Starting in the 1940s, textile mills opened in the Piedmont area. This became popular in the south because of a lower cost on labor and no struggling with union organizations. Even today, the cost of living in this region is much lower when you contrast it with the metropolitan areas.

In Southside, the workforce has become abundant in the textile work, which yields more profit than farming, which was why they shifted over to it. In the 1970s a lot of the textile mills shut their doors for outsourcing to other countries like India, Thailand and Mexico, but furniture manufacturing employed thousands in the region during this time. For example, Bassett Furniture cropped up, and even today, they employ thousands in the town of Bassett. After the 1990s, manufacturing jobs became a major employment option, and you see a variety of manufacturing jobs from ceramics to metals.

Income: What is the Median?

When you examine the median family income, you find it sits at around $32,900. Meanwhile, 6.2 percent comes from the top 20 percent. Looking at students, you will see that 1.7 percent of students who lived in a poor family turned into a rich adult. These statistics show an average standing when you compare it to the rest of the United States. Because unemployment rate is only 4.0 percent, it shows the state has done well in recovering from the economic recession. In fact, Virginia even ranked as the 15th state in 2016 when measuring the unemployment rate.

Property in the Area

On average, houses rent here for around $500 a month, which is pretty cheap compared to the more metropolitan areas. Home values have become a popular subject for the region. Referring to statistics from CLR Search, most homes were valued at $300,00 to $399,000. Meanwhile, the number of owners without a home mortgage sat at 25.73 percent, while the owner households with a mortgage were 74.27 percent. Some more housing statistics include:

• Homes valued at more than $1,000,000 is 2.58 percent
• Homes valued at less than $10,000 is less than 1.20 percent
• The average rental rate is between $500 to $749

If you’re interested in learning more about the area, we’d love to give you a comprehensive real estate analysis of rental properties. For further information, call today. This area is rich with history that dates back to the Colonial Era. The area is more rural than the western part of Virginia, which is why many people have taken a liking to it. They are seeking a quieter area to settle down. Culturally, the Southside has a long-held reputation of being conservative and isolated, which is great for families who prefer this type of lifestyle.