It is no secret that the past year saw a lot of Americans migrating to other states. These migration patterns have only been reinforced by more employers opting to have their employees work remotely. For many Americans, there is no longer a need to factor in a commute time from home to the office. In addition, as Americans have sought out more space they have opted for suburban areas, as opposed to the city life.
U-Haul ranks 50 states by migration growth
As you may know, U-Haul is a moving truck rental organization for the “do-it-yourself” movers. Each year, U-Haul tracks the number of one-way moving truck rentals entering a state and compares them to the number of one-way moving truck rentals exiting a state. The result of this data compilation is the overall migration growth for the country. For the sake of this report, U-Haul considers Washington D.C. as its own market. Meanwhile, Hawaii is not included since state-to-state truck transactions are inapplicable.
For the first time ever, Tennessee came in as the #1 state that Americans moved to in 2020. This also marks the first time that a state not named Florida or Texas came in the top spot since 2015 (when North Carolina was at the top). Not surprisingly, Texas and Florida still came in ranked #2 and #3, respectively. The overall ranking report is below. The previous year’s rankings are listed in parentheses next to each state as well.
| 1. | Tennessee (12) |
| 2. | Texas (2) |
| 3. | Florida (1) |
| 4. | Ohio (7) |
| 5. | Arizona (20) |
| 6. | Colorado (42) |
| 7. | Missouri (13) |
| 8. | Nevada (24) |
| 9. | North Carolina (3) |
| 10. | Georgia (16) |
| 11. | Arkansas (23) |
| 12. | Indiana (9) |
| 13. | Wisconsin (41) |
| 14. | Oklahoma (14) |
| 15. | South Carolina (4) |
| 16. | West Virginia (22) |
| 17. | Utah (8) |
| 18. | Kentucky (37) |
| 19. | Montana (26) |
| 20. | Minnesota (15) |
| 21. | Kansas (18) |
| 22. | Alabama (6) |
| 23. | New Hampshire (31) |
| 24. | Iowa (30) |
| 25. | South Dakota (28) |
| 26. | Vermont (10) |
| 27. | Delaware (21) |
| 28. | Virginia (39) |
| 29. | Maine (33) |
| 30. | Idaho (11) |
| 31. | Mississippi (25) |
| 32. | Nebraska (19) |
| 33. | Wyoming (27) |
| 34. | Alaska (17) |
| 35. | Rhode Island (35) |
| 36. | Washington (5) |
| 37. | North Dakota (32) |
| 38. | Washington, D.C. (38)* |
| 39. | New Mexico (36) |
| 40. | Michigan (48) |
| 41. | Pennsylvania (46) |
| 42. | New York (43) |
| 43. | Connecticut (34) |
| 44. | Louisiana (40) |
| 45. | Oregon (29) |
| 46. | Maryland (45) |
| 47. | Massachusetts (47) |
| 48. | New Jersey (44) |
| 49. | Illinois (50) |
| 50. | California (49) |
Summary
Although this was the first time ever that The Volunteer State came in first place, Florida and Texas seem to consistently be two of the most desirable states to move to in the country. Another interesting finding of this report are the states that more Americans are fleeing from. Although there are many factors impacting the decision to move out of any particular state, it appears that the states that Americans are fleeing all seem to have a high-tax burden combined with more aggressive coronavirus restrictions in place. It should be noted that this report only captures “do-it-yourself” movers. With this said, it is likely that more affluent movers opt to hire professional moving companies. Therefore, this report certainly does not capture all moves made in 2020.
With regards to South Florida specifically, it has always ranked as one of the most desirable places to live in the country. We absolutely see this trend continuing, particularly as more companies also opt to relocate to The Sunshine State. Are you considering a move to South Florida? Contact Live South Florida Realty, Inc. today. No other real estate brokerage knows the South Florida market better than we do. Let us prove it to you.
