- Movers from California are typically younger, make a modest income, and don't have advanced degrees.
- Many are moving to Texas and Arizona, though some like the appeal of a smaller town out east.
The typical mover who left California in 2022 is Gen Z or millennial, unmarried, and makes $53,500 a year.
A Business Insider analysis of individual-level data from the Census Bureau's 2022 American Community Survey, assembled by the University of Minnesota's IPUMS program, found that nearly 65% of people who moved away from California over the age of 15 are Gen Z or millennials.
The specific breakdown was 26.8% Gen Z and 37.9% millennial. Gen Z is defined by the Pew Research Center as being born between 1997 and 2012, while millennials are defined as born between 1981 and 1996. Gen X — born between 1965 and 1980 — made up 16.6%, while baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964 were 15.9%.
Many Californians are moving to states with lower costs of living, slower paces of life, improved work-life balance, and better climate conditions.
Overall, around 818,000 people left California between 2021 and 2022 — while only 475,800 moved in per the Census Bureau's tabulation of ACS data. Over 102,000 moved from California to Texas, while over 74,000 relocated to Arizona. Other popular states included Florida, Washington, and Nevada.
On the flip side, around 42,300 former Texans moved to California, while nearly 32,000 former Washington residents made the same move. Some people who moved to California from states including Tennessee and Florida told Business Insider California's weather, business and health resources, and infrastructure pulled them in.
Around 62.2% of movers from California are employed, while 4.6% are unemployed. Nearly a third — 32.3% — are not in the labor force, made up partly of retirees and students. On average, movers made $53,566 a year in professions ranging from lawyers to teachers to engineers. This value may skew lower due to the number of movers with little income while in school or retirees on Social Security.
Less than 41% of those who moved have a bachelor's degree or higher, while 7% have an associate's degree. Nearly 28% have a high school diploma or GED or did not complete high school.
These movers also skew slightly male at a bit over 51%. Additionally, 45.5% of movers are single or unmarried, while 41.2% are married. Nearly 8.3% of movers are divorced.
Business Insider previously spoke to six people who moved from California to North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Oklahoma.
Why people are leaving California
While some moved away from California for a more peaceful — and cheaper — retirement, others relocated for better work opportunities.
Take Sandra, who's in her early 50s and moved from the Los Angeles area to the North Carolina shore earlier this year. After seeing prices rising and many more out-of-staters moving in, she decided she could retire to a beach house out east without as much financial stress.
She previously told BI she misses the California weather, though she loves her coastal property. Her North Carolina home cost $1.2 million, which she and her husband paid off in full. Her new home, which has slightly higher insurance payments than in California, is similar in size to her North California home, which sold for over $2 million.
"I liked the idea of moving here, but I thought, I hate the heat, and if I'm going to move here, I need to be near the ocean and I have to be somewhere that's air conditioned or has a pool," Sandra said.
A common theme was a drop in prices in their new states. For Sandra, gas prices came in about 40% cheaper in North Carolina, while taxes were cut by around half.
For Bob Giramma, 63, moving to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, meant cheaper home prices than in San Diego, as well as less expensive utility bills, car registration, and restaurants. Tennessee also presented him with more business opportunities as "one of the smoothest places to do business."
"You don't see ostentatious wealth and you don't see abject poverty," Giramma previously told BI. "A lot of people are in the middle, and in terms of diversity, my neighbors are of every race, ethnicity, and national origin."
In addition to cheaper prices, Bill Ross, 65, said his new state of Texas provided better education for his kids, had better infrastructure, and was home to much friendlier people. Ross moved from Silicon Valley to the city of Boerne in Hill Country about a half hour north of San Antonio.
He bought a four-bedroom, three-bath house on 0.8 acres with a pool for around half the cost of a similar home in Silicon Valley. He said he felt at home in Texas almost immediately in his still culturally diverse, calmer area.
"People in the San Francisco-Bay Area have sufficient equity in their houses to buy newer, nicer, and bigger homes in Texas outright, negating the entire notion of high interest rates," Ross previously told BI. "Government regulations aren't preventing construction from keeping up with demand."
Bigger city to smaller town
Another trend among some movers is moving from a bigger city in California to a more rural area in a different state. A. Duvall, 47, who asked to just use the first initial of her first name to protect her privacy, recently moved from San Diego County to Paducah, Kentucky, a small city with around 26,000 residents.
Since she receives Social Security Disability Insurance, her income is modest, but she was able to find a home for just $60,000 that fits her needs. Her bills went down drastically, and she feels much safer, despite the occasional tornado in Kentucky.
Jan Pfrimmer, 72, also made the move from San Diego to a much smaller town. She relocated to Shepherdstown, West Virginia, a town of 1,500 residents, which she said is much more peaceful, even though there's a lot less going on.
While she acknowledged it's not the most lively place especially for younger Americans, it fits everything she wanted: plenty of nature, a townhouse for a third of what her house was worth in California, and better medical care.
"I find the sound of the trains going through town comforting, I don't know why," Pfrimmer said. "I find something everyday in nature out here, and that brings me a great deal of joy."
For some Gen Z and millennials, moving away from California presents opportunities to get a fresh start. Laura Landers, 32, moved from Los Angeles, where she worked at a social media management firm, to Tulsa, a city of 400,000 in Oklahoma, through a program called Tulsa Remote that gave her $10,000 to move.
Though Tulsa was different from the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles, she said the city was near perfect for launching her clothing line, as she said Tulsa is an "entrepreneur city" with strong support networks. The lower cost of living also reduced some anxiety and gave her the opportunity to become an entrepreneur.
"Tulsa was all the parts of LA that I loved because it's still a city, and I wasn't willing or ready to give up that city life, but it did have the small-town charm where everybody was super kind and genuine," Landers previously told BI. "LA is not necessarily genuine. People might be kind but it's a fake kind just to get through."
Have you recently moved to a new state? Contact this reporter at nsheidlower@businessinsider.com.