Approximately 42,508 Californians moved to Nevada in 2023, according to a new study.
Nevada ranked 13th in the country for number of people who moved into the state in 2023 while Texas came in first followed by Florida and North Carolina, based on the study from Storage Cafe, which used U.S. Census Bureau data.
“The Silver State continues to be a migration hot spot for those looking to escape more expensive cities, which is in turn driving up prices in the state,” said Bianca Barsan, a communications specialist with Storage Cafe, which is owned by Yardi.
“With home prices up 39 percent in the past five years, demand remains strong, positioning Nevada as a key migration destination for those seeking economic opportunities and a better quality of life,” she said. “California is the top feeder state, sending 42,500 new residents, many of them highly educated and financially well-positioned.”
Barsan explained that nearly half of these newcomers purchased a home soon after arrival, taking advantage of Nevada’s lower home prices than California (translating into $284,700 in savings). With 24 percent of those movers working remotely, many can keep their West Coast salaries while capitalizing on Nevada’s lower cost of living.
Millennials (29 percent) represented the large demographic moving to Nevada in 2023, followed by Gen Z and approximately 39 percent of all people who moved to Nevada that year bought homes within the first year of living in the state.
On the the flip side, 21,633 Nevadans moved to California in 2023.
Nearly 158,000 people relocated to Nevada from California from 2020 through 2023, making up 43 percent of all new residents to the Silver State during the past four years, according to data from the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles.
Over the past four years, ending 2023, the most California residents moved to Nevada in 2021 (47,376), followed by 2022 (42,569), according to driver’s license surrender data obtained from the DMV by the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The total number of new residents to Nevada from 2020 through 2023 based on the data was 369,878, with 211,893 coming from other states besides California.
Home prices in the valley recently reached new record highs as cash buyers continue to make up a substantial portion of the market, many of them from California where their purchasing power is much higher. Cash buyers purchased approximately 161,084 homes in the Las Vegas Valley since the start of 2011, according to historical data from Redfin obtained by the Review-Journal.
According to Storage Cafe, the overall rate of Americans moving to different states has been steadily dropping since 2014 with a small bump during the pandemic and the report credits “worsening affordability” as one of the main drivers and many households “locked” into low mortgage rates they got during or before the pandemic.
Who else is moving to Nevada?
Colorado was the second highest state that sent residents to Nevada with more than 8,600 movers and 72 percent of them remain renters. Despite Nevada offering 20 percent more affordable housing than Colorado, according to the Storage Cafe report, only 26 percent of Coloradans bought homes after relocating and nearly a third (31 percent) are working remotely.
Arizona came third as close to 8,600 residents moved to Nevada in 2023, with 31 percent of them becoming homeowners within their first year, even though Nevada’s home prices are 7 percent higher than Arizona.
In terms out outbound movement from Nevada, after California the top states were Texas (8,600) and Utah (8,100).
Contact Patrick Blennerhassett at pblennerhassett@reviewjournal.com.
