10
Loading video...
By Giulia Carbonaro
Senior Reporter
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
Americans are moving less than they used to during the pandemic, when the rise of remote work allowed tens of thousands to leave crowded, expensive metropolises for cheaper havens across state lines, but some cities are still rapidly losing residents, data shows.
The latest report from the Bank of America Institute on Americans on the move, released on Friday, found that Memphis, Tennessee, experienced the sharpest net population drop of any major U.S. metropolitan area in the second quarter of 2026, down by nearly 1 percent compared to a year earlier.
It was followed by Washington, D.C. (-0.73 percent), Los Angeles (-0.63 percent), Boston (-0.60 percent), Miami (-0.57 percent), Baltimore (-0.53 percent), Orlando (-0.49 percent), New York (-0.48 percent), San Jose (-0.44 percent), and St. Louis (-0.41 percent), a list which includes some of the most expensive cities in the country.
Read More on News
...
Affordability Is Key Reason Behind Americans’ Moves
Mobility has slowed down among Americans in the second quarter of the year, the Bank of America Institute found, with declines reported across income groups, generations and move types.
But the sharpest pullbacks were experienced by lower-income households and millennials, a generation that has long struggled to build up wealth and reach traditional life milestones like homeownership - showing that affordability is an important factor in the moving equation.
That is why the Midwest, a traditionally more affordable region in the country compared to the Northeast and the West, led the country in population growth in the second quarter of 2026, accounting for most of the fastest-growing metros in the country. These include Indianapolis (+1.87 percent in the second quarter of the year, compared to a year earlier), Columbus (+1.24 percent), Louisville (+1.15 percent), Cincinnati (+0.99 percent), Milwaukee (+0.99 percent), Minneapolis (+0.89 percent), Grand Rapids (+0.70 percent) and Cleveland (+0.37 percent).
It was a non-Midwestern city, however, to top the list of the cities which have seen the biggest year-over-year population growth in the second quarter of the year, up 1.88 percent - Salt Lake City, Utah.
The city’s appeal to newcomers is hardly a new phenomenon: for years, Salt Lake City’s low employment rate, booming job market, outdoor opportunities, and relatively lower cost of living compared to other major western cities have been attracting new residents.
In Salt Lake City, the median sale price of a home was $642,678 in June, according to Redfin, while the median household income between 2020 and 2024 was $75,090, adjusted for 2024 inflation, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Similarly, Indianapolis boasts a low cost of living and relatively affordable housing market, a thriving job market, and something of an exciting food and cultural scene. Here the median sale price was $258,859 in June, while the median household income was $66,219 between 2020 and 2024.
Raleigh, North Carolina, up 1.25 percent from a year earlier, has a strong job market, decent life amenities, and good universities - all while offering relatively affordable housing, increasingly a rarity in the U.S. Here the median household income was $86,309 in 2020, according to city officials’ data, while the median sale price of a home in the city was $424,769.
By comparison, the median sale price of a typical U.S. home was $408,776 in June, according to Redfin.
The Cities Experiencing the Sharpest Population Pullbacks
If there are winners in the country’s population growth race, there are also losers, and once again it has a lot to do with affordability - with one significant exception.
The cost of living is not the main reason why Memphis’ population is shrinking, as the city is relatively affordable. According to comparison website Numbeo, the estimated monthly costs for a single person living in Memphis are $1,123.9, which makes the city 23.7 percent less expensive than Los Angeles.
Another comparison website, Payscale, puts the cost of living in the city at 11 percent lower than the national average.
And yet, according to data mentioned by Smart City Memphis, the city lost 13,785 people between 2010 and 2020 and an additional 22,185 between 2020 and 2024, creating a total population loss of 35,970 since 2010.
It is the lack of job opportunities and high crime levels that have caused Memphis to hemorrhage residents in recent years, while neighboring Nashville has boomed. Memphis was, in fact, the only city among Tennessee’s 10 largest that did not grow between 2020 and 2025, according to Census Bureau data.
The high cost of living, together with the desire for relocating somewhere more affordable, has likely driven residents to leave many of the other cities in the list - including Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Boston, and Miami.
According to Payscale, the cost of living is 39 percent higher in Washington, D.C., than the national average, while it is 52 percent higher in Los Angeles. Boston is somewhere in between, with the cost of living in the city estimated by the company as 48 percent higher than the national average.
Miami, which recently beat New York for cost of living, had an estimated cost of living 20 percent higher than the national average.
For many of these cities, housing is one of the biggest expenses crushing residents. In Washington, D.C., the median sale price of a home was $699,619 in June; in Los Angeles, it was $1.1 million; in Boston, it was $859,532; and in Miami, it was $649,646.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Matthew Robinson and Cristina Diciu.
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines