Southern Gap in Buchanan County will have the first subdivision of a new housing development program that is also serving Dickenson, Tazewell and Russell counties.
The Cumberland Plateau Co., a nonprofit under the district’s planning commission, is launching a program to bring single-family, middle-income homes across the four counties.
The work will begin with a pilot home in Russell County and, once completed, a 24-home subdivision in the Southern Gap — a former strip-mine site near Grundy that has been converted into several facilities, including Buchanan County’s new consolidated high school. The pilot home in Lebanon will be available for purchase early next year, and the first two homes at Southern Gap are expected to be completed by summer 2027.
Southwest Virginia is facing a housing shortage while trying to attract industry to the region, and workforce development housing is a solution some localities are banking on. Similar to ongoing projects in Wise County, the planning commission is stepping in to address the workforce housing need, said Scotty Wampler, executive director of the Cumberland Plateau Planning District Commission and Cumberland Plateau Co.
Wampler said the program will focus on acquiring properties with basic infrastructure that could house the modular homes the program will support. The homes will be built off-site and assembled on permanent foundations, he said, which offers similar quality to on-site construction but at a more affordable price.
Wampler said he anticipates that homes under this program will be sold for less than $250,000, but final prices will depend on development costs.
As they continue to look at sites across the four counties, one of the goals is to not develop in flood-prone areas, giving residents across the region the opportunity to relocate out of the floodplain.
It’s difficult to find land that isn’t in a floodplain or on a mountainside, especially in Dickenson and Buchanan counties, and sites that might not have infrastructure to support housing, like sewer and broadband, Wampler said.
“That narrows the availability quite a bit,” he said in a phone interview. “We have to get a little creative … to promote affordability in our four counties, and insulate our population to catastrophic flooding events.”
The Buchanan County Industrial Development Authority conveyed the 12-acre property on Southern Gap to the company, he said, and the company purchased the Lebanon property from a private developer. They will sell the houses for the same amount it takes to build them, Wampler added, and money will revolve back into the fund once properties are sold.
“We will essentially use the same pot of funding to develop over, and over and over… to just continue building homes,” he said. “In theory, it’s a revolving program mechanism that could last forever.”
This is the second subdivision to come to Southern Gap. The first development was privately developed, and the IDA sold lots for individual construction.
Wampler said he is starting to compile a wait list of qualified buyers, and those interested can reach out to The Cumberland Plateau Co.
