College Station-Bryan ranked six among all U.S. cities in the net number of one-way U-Haul rentals into the area!
Last week, the truck rental company U-Haul released its “U-Haul Growth Index” for states and for cities. The methodology is simply to calculate the difference between the number of one-way rentals into a specified geographic area and the number of one-way rentals departing from a specified geographic area. So, for example, the U-Haul growth index for the state of Texas counts one-way rentals that originated outside of Texas and end within the Texas boundary, minus the number of one-way rentals that originate anywhere in Texas and end somewhere outside of Texas. Intrastate moves are not counted.
Similarly, the U-Haul growth index for a city – say College Station-Bryan, is based on the difference between the number of one-way rentals that begin outside of College Station-Bryan and terminate within the College Station-Bryan boundary, minus the number of one-way rentals originating in College Station-Bryan and ending at a geographic location outside of the College Station-Bryan boundary. In this case, moves between cities within a state are included in the city rankings.
So, what is the result? At the state level, Texas ranked first and Florida second. Texas has been ranked first in six of the last eight years. Florida has been ranked in the top four for nine years and was ranked first in 2019. At the other end of the ranking, California is dead last in 2023, as it was in 2022, and New York is 43, up a bit from its rank of 46 in 2022.
U-Haul does not report the numbers they calculate for the net one-way moves, just the rankings, so it is not possible to tell just how much difference there is between states with different rankings.
At the city level, the top ten U-Haul U.S. Growth Cities includes three Texas cities. Austin ranks number 5, Dallas at number 9, but perhaps surprisingly, College Station-Bryan appears at number 6. Conroe appears at number 16. Interestingly, Austin and Dallas and College Station-Bryan were not in the top 25 cities in 2022, although Conroe was at 9. Florida has three cities in the top 10, and 7 in the top 25. Florida had seven cities ranked in the top 25, Texas four, and North Carolina three. South Carolina, Alabama, Idaho, Tennessee, and Arizona all had two cities in the top 25, and Nevada one.
College Station – Bryan is a relatively small area, so small changes in the number of movers in or out will change the ranking, and smaller cities would therefore have a more volatile place in the U-Haul rankings. For instance, College Station – Bryan was not ranked in the top 25 in 2022. In 2021, it was ranked seventh nationally. Nonetheless, this is a suggestive ranking that provides one take on population movements. It is no coincidence that southern and some western states have net inflows of one-way movers, while northeast states and California tend to have net outflows of one-way movers.
In December 2023, the U.S. Census Bureau released population estimates from July 2022 to July 2023 for states and nationwide. Based on that report, Florida ranked first in net domestic migration followed by Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Net domestic migration is defined as the difference between in-migration (people moving in) and out migration (people moving out) in the migration period July 1 of one year to June 30 of the next year of a given geographic area (source: U.S. Census Bureau). The map below shows the states with the migration flows. The lighter shade states show where more people moved in and the states with darker shades of blue are the ones where more people moved out.
Figure 1. Net Domestic Migration
Figure 2. Top 10 States with Net Domestic Migration
In the map panel of the dashboard above, counties with yellow shades have negative net domestic migration and the counties with shades of darker green have reported positive net migration. The bar graphs below show the components of population change. The change in total population includes two major components, natural change which is births – deaths and net migration which includes net international migration and net domestic migration.
For example, hovering over in Brazos County in the map shows the population change in the county between July 2021 and July 2022 (July 2022 and July 2023 County data not yet released). The change in population in the Brazos County from the previous migration period July 2020 to July 2021 is due to the positive net migration and natural change of 3132 and 1365 people respectively. Hovering over each county in the map will change the graphs dynamically to reflect the population change components of that county. The dashboard also lists the counties with the highest net domestic migration and counties from where mass exodus is taking place. Los Angeles, California lost 142,953 people in the period July 2021-July 2022. The county with the largest influx of population was Maricopa, Arizona.