As COVID-era "Zoomtowns" and the urban exodus fade into history, which city in every state is most popular for Americans who want to move now?
Between 2020 and 2023, the fastest-growing cities exploded with incoming remote workers who wanted to live larger and cheaper. And many sought homeownership—buying a home is a key factor in where Americans choose to put down roots.
But the fastest-growing cities of 2021 or 2022 aren't the boomtowns of today. So why are we relying on backward-looking census data to tell us where Americans want to move now?
Using search data from the Moving Cost Calculator, moveBuddha found out where people are planning to move in 2024. This analysis gathered searches made from July 2023 to March 2024 with a "planned move date" at any point in 2024.
So, what cities are Americans loving the most, by state, for their 2024 moves?
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1 / 6Not all will finalize their moves so it won't be known for sure where today's movers are going until 2024's census data becomes available in the spring of 2025. But their interest reveals a lot about their dreams and plans for the coming year before they even move.
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2 / 6
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3 / 6The top 10 cities highlight a variety of preferences, but underscore a common desire for quality of life, community, and affordability.
Five of the top cities are cultural havens nested in nature, such as Boulder, Asheville, Burlington, Chattanooga, and Billings. While Cheyenne, Decatur, and Conroe highlight the interest in smaller urban areas, top retiree destinations like The Villages and Myrtle Beach round out the list.
The Villages is a racehorse that's outpacing every other city in the country for growth. Fueled by a "silver tsunami," this Baby Boomtown has been on the rise for a decade and shows no signs of slowing down in 2024. With baby boomers reaching retirement age through 2031, the Florida destination is poised for even more growth in years to come. After all, where else can you make a golf cart your primary vehicle?
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4 / 6While real estate prices are key in move decisions, the fastest-growing destinations aren't necessarily those with the lowest real estate prices. The top ten, for example, have an average home value of $422,988, which is more than the average of all the top-growing cities ($374,015). Because so many high move-out cities in the U.S. have sky-high housing costs, it's likely that above-average home prices in highly desirable cities feel like bargains to newcomers.
Even still, four of these cities all have homes under the average U.S. home value ($343K): Myrtle Beach, Decatur, Chattanooga, and Conroe. In fact, Conroe is one of the fastest-growing affordable suburbs.
Ultimately, cities on this list balance recreational, cultural, and economic opportunities with affordability, space, and size. The balance seems to be worth it for many movers in 2024.
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5 / 6Looking for the most housing bang for your buck? Check out these desirable gems in affordable communities that are catching the attention of movers right now.
Five winning cities even have housing under the $200K mark: Dayton, OH; Hartford, CT; Tulsa, OK; Des Moines, IA; and Champaign, IL.
The Midwest isn't known for its desirability. An unglamorous workhorse for centuries, it's used to being called the "Rust Belt" and taking snowstorm jokes on the chin. But there's a renaissance in the region that's being dubbed a climate oasis. Want fewer earthquakes, smog days, and wildfire scares?
Your most affordable option is Dayton, OH. Once home to high-flying bicycle salesmen Orville and Wilbur Wright, Dayton still has close ties to aviation with nearby Wright Patterson Air Force base. Residents enjoy their human-sized city and make quick trips to Columbus or Cincinnati when they need the scratch their major league sports or big concert itch.
What's the most popular of the cheap locales? That's Little Rock, which is seeing almost double the number of move-ins as move-outs this year. With a thriving music scene and plenty of mountain biking trails, it's an oasis for the kind of quality of life that defines cities that are up and coming in 2024. Oh, and it's also the "secret foodie city" you never knew about. So grab a fork.
moveBuddha
6 / 6Boulder is an outlier on this list, where affordability is crucial, if not overriding.
Rather than being a treasure of affordability, Boulder has some of the highest housing prices in the country. But with its college-town culture, mountain lifestyle, and high annual sun hours close to the economic hub of Denver, people are still pouring in. They'll pay $958,651 for an average home here. Regardless, Boulder still comes in at #10 of all the states for the sheer number of in-moves (double that of the city's out-moves).
If the most expensive cities have one thing in common, it's that it's hard to score a better housing deal elsewhere in the state.
From California to Hawaii, Massachusetts, Washington, and Vermont, the most expensive desirable cities hold their own against other in-state cities with their quality of life amenities, though their prices mirror statewide trends.
Searches for new moves into 2024's top cities in each state don't align with census population growth metrics from 2021 to 2022.
In fact, three cities in this top ten had negative population growth from 2021 to 2022, suggesting that Americans' moving patterns are undergoing a shift. The cities that Americans want to move to more today than in 2022? They're Asheville, NC (the data was gathered before the recent hurricane), Cheyenne, WY, and Burlington, VT.
Americans are prioritizing the cost of home ownership in 2024 moves. While the average home cost across these 50 cities is higher than U.S. norms, in 23 of the cities, home prices fall under the national average.
In the end, it seems that the remote work revolution has permanently impacted some destinations: Large cities are notably absent from the winners' circle.
About half of these winners (21, to be exact) are small cities with 100,000 to 300,000 residents, and no city has more than a million inhabitants. That may indicate that the nation's largest cities aren't the best spots to nurture a career in 2024, and movers are prioritizing smaller economies with higher quality of life.
Want to enjoy the lectures and arts a college town brings to the community? Olympia, Burlington, Boulder, and Eugene could be your ticket.
Want to retire to a place with great vibes? Chattanooga, Palm Springs, Asheville, Myrtle Beach, and The Villages offer a great mix of climate and activities.
Ready to lace up a new pair of hiking boots? Try mountain towns Billings, Burlington, and Boulder.
The most popular cities in each state tend to have a few things in common: They're chock full of value for the money, with many growing cities priced affordably in their regions. From music to food, culture, and recreation, they're often small towns that are big on fun.
Are big cities out for 2024? It looks that way. If one thing remains on the moving landscape from the COVID-19 era, it's a continued emphasis on life-work balance—that trend isn't going anywhere.
To determine the top move-to city in every state, moveBuddha looked at its most recent mover search data to compile a list of moves planned for 2024. The data used for this analysis includes searches made at any time between July 1, 2023, and March 3, 2024, where searches indicated they were planning to move at any time in 2024.
Only cities with at least 25 searches for moves both in and out were considered, resulting in three states (Mississippi, North Dakota, and West Virginia) being excluded due to a lack of sufficiently representative city-specific data.
There were four states that didn't have a single city in the dataset with a in-to-out ratio greater than "1" meaning there was not technically a top "move to" city according to mover search data. These cities, instead, were the least "moved out" of cities in their state:
The Zillow Home Value Index data (Jan 2024) was also used for home averages and Census population estimates.
Here's the full list of the top cities in each state.
