91,000 More People Moved Into Arizona than Out Last Year, Helping Tilt it Blue

People moving from expensive states like New York to the more affordable Atlanta area may be one factor tipping Georgia in Joe Biden’s favor.  

California’s out-of-reach-housing costs may have helped tilt  Arizona blue in the 2020 presidential election. Joe Biden won Arizona by roughly 11,500 votes, while President Trump won the state by more than 90,000 votes in 2016. Biden captured Maricopa County, home to Phoenix and a popular destination for people leaving California, by 2 percentage points, a reversal from Trump’s 2.8 percentage-point win in 2016.

Arizona saw roughly 91,000 more residents move in from other states than leave in 2019, the third biggest net increase of any state, according to the U.S. Census.

On the flip side, California lost a net 200,000 residents to other states last year, more than any other state, per the U.S. Census. Expensive metros like the Bay Area and Los Angeles perennially top Redfin’s list of places Redfin.com users are leaving.

Movement away from California has accelerated with the pandemic and the accompanying shift toward remote work. Nearly 53,000 more Redfin.com users looked to move out of California than move in during the third quarter, a 62% increase since the third quarter of 2019 and the highest rate since Redfin started tracking migration in the beginning of 2017.  

On a metro level, Phoenix was the fourth-most popular destination in the country for people looking to move to a different metro in the third quarter, when 34.3% of Redfin.com searches in Phoenix came from users outside the area, up from 31.6% during the same time period last year. Of the people moving into Phoenix from out of state in the third quarter, 23.5% were from Los Angeles, a larger share than any other origin, and 7% were from the Bay Area. 

The Phoenix metro is much more affordable than coastal California, with the typical home selling for $330,000 in September, though prices were up 16.6% from the year before, partly due to people moving in from pricey coastal areas. The typical home in the Los Angeles metro sold for $730,000 in September, and the typical home the Bay Area sold for $1.45 million.

“Phoenix is one of the fastest growing metro areas in the United States, and that gain has been largely the result of California’s loss,” said Redfin chief economist Daryl Fairweather. “It’s not necessarily that Californians are seeking out a place with less liberal politics—many of them simply like that Phoenix has warm weather and a strong economy, but much more affordable homes. People who aren’t able to afford a home in the Bay Area or Los Angeles can purchase a spacious home with ample outdoor space in Phoenix, with mortgage payments equal to or less than their California rent payments. Arizona could move from being a swing state to a Democratic stronghold in future elections as even more Californians relocate due to the pandemic and remote work.”

Phoenix has been a top destination for people moving across state borders since Redfin started tracking migration in the beginning of 2017, with the number of people moving in growing over the years. The Phoenix metro experienced a net inflow of nearly 8,500 Redfin.com users in the third quarter, an uptick from about 6,200 during the same time period last year and a major acceleration from 3,200 in the third quarter of 2017. A net inflow is the number of people looking to move in minus the number of people looking to leave.

Local Redfin agent Kelly Khalil said she has noticed more people moving into Phoenix than ever before. 

“I’m constantly meeting homebuyers from coastal states, especially California, Washington and Oregon,” Khalil said. “When I was growing up in Arizona, Phoenix wasn’t very popular. There were no restaurants and not many people lived in the downtown area, but the city has turned its image around and is now a hotspot for people from across the West Coast.”

People moving to Georgia from pricey East Coast metros could be one factor tipping the state toward the Democratic nominee

In the eastern part of the country, people moving to Atlanta from expensive places like New York and Washington, D.C. may be one factor of many—including activism and a major get-out-the-vote effort—helping tilt Georgia blue. 

Biden was ahead in Georgia by about 14,000 votes as of Friday  at 11 a.m. EST, while President Trump won there by roughly 211,000 votes in 2016. In Fulton County, home to Atlanta, Biden was up by 46 percentage points, an uptick from Democrats’ 40.6 percentage-point margin in 2016.

Georgia saw roughly 50,000 more residents move in from other states than leave in 2019, the sixth biggest net increase of any state, per the U.S. Census. 

New York had the opposite trend, losing a net 180,000 residents to other states in 2019, more than any other state except California. 

Like California, migration out of New York has accelerated this year with remote work. Nearly 47,000 more Redfin.com users looked to leave the state than move in during the third quarter, up 35% from the same time period last year. 

In Atlanta, 26.2% of Redfin.com searches were from users outside the area, about the same as the 26.5% share in the third quarter of 2019. New York was the top origin for people looking to move into Atlanta from out of state in the third quarter of this year, with 35.9% of searches from outside the area coming from New York, and Washington, D.C. was the number two origin. 

Housing in Atlanta is more affordable than New York or Washington, D.C. The median sale price in the Atlanta metro in September was $280,000, versus $550,000 in the New York metro (excluding New York City) and $457,000 in the Washington, D.C. metro.

The number of people moving into Atlanta has accelerated over the last three years: About 7,200 more Redfin.com users looked to move into Atlanta than leave in the third quarter, up from about 5,900 during the same time period last year and roughly 3,000 in the third quarter of 2017.

Methodology

The metro-level migration part of this analysis is based on a sample of more than 2 million Redfin.com users who searched for homes across 87 metro areas that make up roughly 80% of the U.S. population, excluding searches unlikely to precede an actual relocation or home purchase. To be included in this dataset, a Redfin.com user must have viewed at least 10 homes in a particular metro area, and homes in that area must make up at least 80% of the user’s searches.

Data on statewide migration is from the U.S. Census.