The Knoxville Chamber’s housing program for Nationals is up and running for this year, and applications are now being accepted for the week of August 7th to the 10th.

Demand for a place to stay surges during Nationals week, and for years the Chamber has given local residents the opportunity to open their homes and visitors the chance to find one to stay at while in town.

Hannah Vander Veer from the Knoxville Chamber tells KNIA/KRLS News they help bring homeowners and renters together, and leave the final details to the parties involved.

“When a visitor comes to us and they submit their information, there’s quite a few questions that we ask them to be able to pair them up with a homeowner that matches them. From there, we exchange the information with the visitor and with the homeowner, and then it is on their responsibility to figure the rest out,” Vander Veer says.

“If it doesn’t work out, that’s completely fine; that’s all up to the visitor and the homeowner. But we’d be more than happy to find them a new pair if that should ever happen.”

Vander Veer says last year they had 116 matches involving visitors finding homes to stay at; she says if one works out well, the visitors often wind becoming friends with their hosts and returning to the same house each year