Awesome Moving Industry Statistics for 2022

Moving is one of the industries that hasn’t been slowed down even by the pandemic. It just keeps growing. It’s a business that annually generates an estimated $86 billion in revenue. Astonishing isn’t it? Well, knowing that an average American moves a bit less than 12 times makes it a lot less surprising. In order to enhance your knowledge about the moving industry and all of its juicy statistics, we decided to put together this article.  By reading this you might get even better at picking cross-country movers from now on! The goal of this article is to go over all of the important moving industry statistics for 2022 you might be interested in. From general statistics, all the way to economic statistics, we’ve got it all! So without further ado, let’s check out what we’ve got in store for you!

Let’s start with the basics

First off, let’s go over some industry of moving statistics for 2022 that cover the basics of the whole industry. To start off, according to Census data, an average American doesn’t move more than once a year. Alongside that, the average American will move an expected 11.7 times during their lifetime. When you think about it, that is quite a large number. But not nearly as big as the number of Americans that have moved in the year 2021. About 27 million Americans moved in the year 2021, adding up to 8,4% of the US population. In all honesty, that number has dropped in comparison to the last few years. In 2020 approximately 9.3% of Americans moved (29 million), and that number was even higher during the year 2019. So that means that despite the fact that the population of the US has been growing, moving has slowed down.

Despite fewer people moving than the previous years, the moving industry statistics for 2022 say that the market size is $19 billion in total. Apart from that, there are an estimated 7,000 active moving businesses in the United States. All of those businesses, large or small, account for 50,000 moving trucks. Professional movers help with about 650,000 moves per year. Since we mentioned professional movers, there are about 114,240 employees in the moving industry. So looking at these numbers, getting into the moving industry is definitely worth it. Especially since estimations say that the industry will steadily be rising by an annual 1.0%.

Where do people move according to moving industry statistics for 2022?

So do people move out of State, or within the same county? How many people moved out of the country? According to 2022 statistics for the moving industry, almost 60% of Americans moved within the same county. Making it the most popular moving choice by far. Moving on, approximately 21% moved to a different county within the same State. While 17% of people moved out to live in another State, just 2.24% of Americans decided to leave their country and move elsewhere. So, moving to another country is truly the rarest of occasions. If we are talking about the exact routes that people take, California to Texas takes the crown. Alongside the busiest route, moving from NYC to Florida is fairly popular, right next to California to Washington.

To which states do people move?

As many as 250,000 people have moved to the Southern part of the United States. On the other hand, the number of people that moved to the Northeast of the US is 227,000. To be more precise, the State with the largest population growth is Idaho, with an approximate population growth of 2.1%. Idaho has grown from a population consisting of 1,789,060 citizens, all the way up to 1,826,913. Meaning that the need for cross-country movers in Idaho has risen even more, with the industry growing further. That’s what the statistics of the moving industry in 2022 say. Next up is Arizona, with a population growth of 1.7%. Other states worth mentioning are Nevada (1.54% population growth), Utah (1.45%), and Texas (1.29%).

When we talk about which State has the most move-ins vs. move-outs, we are talking about Montana, with an in-to-out ratio of 2.74 in 2021. Montana has been keeping itself sturdy, seems like people really enjoy living there. Right after Montana, we have Maine with a steady in-to-out ratio of 2.24, followed by Florida with an in-to-out ratio of 2.1.

Which states are people leaving based on moving industry statistics for 2022?

People leave states for a large variety of reasons, from high living costs to dangerous areas. Let’s take a look at the list of states people leave most often:

• California – Now, even though California is a state with a great climate and a long list of tech companies, it’s been the most moved out of state in 2021. Because of rising housing costs, rising taxes, and other reasons, about 101,000 households moved out of California. Texas reports that as many as 1 in 4 people that moved into Texas are from California. Seems like moving from California to Texas is a go-to route for Californians.
• New York – Moving on, New York has also seen a large decline of 75,000 families according to moving statistics for 2022. With so many people moving into mid-sized cities, it’s not such a big surprise.
• Other places worth mentioning – Some other locations that people leave the most are Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts.

The costs of moving

There are a lot of factors that go into moving expenses, but one of the most important expenses is labor. You will most likely need to pay the most amount of money for the labor. The next factor is actual transportation, where things like gas prices affect the cost of moving. Most local movers charge hourly rates and their price varies widely according to the number of things to transfer. So let’s get into the moving industry statistics for 2022. Approximately, local movers for a studio will cost $450 on average, and the average cost for a one-bedroom place is $560. The cost of moving a 2-bedroom home starts from $750 and goes all the way up to $1,935. Upcoming, we’ve got moving a 3-bedroom home with a price range of $1,020-$3,203. Finishing off with a 4-bedroom place, we’re talking about an expense of $1,230 to $4,950.

Those were just the local moving estimates! Let’s look at long-distance moving. If you are moving for mileage of less than 50 you can expect expenses in the range of $750-$3,203 for a 2/3 bedroom home. If you are moving for 250-1000 miles, don’t be surprised by a price estimate between $1,900 and $4,815 for a 2/3 bedroom place. Now, if you are moving from NYC to Florida, which is more than 1000 miles, you’ll be looking at a cost varying from $3,320 to $9,800. As you can see yourself, the 2022 yearly moving industry statistics tell us that the expense of moving has gone up since last year. With the cost going up by 15% since last year, there is no telling how high the price of moving can get.

Demographic moving industry statistics for 2022

We always have to spend some time looking through the basic demographics in order to understand what to expect in this huge industry. According to census data, we’ve got that the average mover is a 25 to 34-year-old. Note that the median age is 39.2. Our average mover is married and a native American, with a high school graduation. Also worth mentioning is that the median income for those moving is $35,506. Next up, according to 2022 moving industry statistics, renters move more, they added up to about 15% of the total number of renters. From another angle, we can see that just about 5% of owners decided to move out during the year.

Moving on, there’s data on the fact that most moved housings consist of 2 bedrooms, with the 3-bedroom housing creeping right behind. We’ve already mentioned how many times the average person moves, which was a bit less than 12. While Millennials used to hold the trophy for the most likely to move, they have been in a decline during the year 2021. The 2010s had seen about 15% of millennials moving locally, and it dropped down to 9.4% in 2021. Now, the trophy has been stolen by Gen-Z, with a 32% chance of them moving during the pandemic itself.

What are the reasons behind moving?

With such a large number of people moving, there has to be a good reason behind those actions. So let’s check out why exactly are people moving out of their homes in search of a better place to stay in. Leading since 2017, housing prices still rock up top with 46% of people moving because of that exact reason in 2021. As we all well know, housing prices have seen quite a rise in the past few years, which makes these moving industry statistics for 2022 not so surprising. Housing prices are followed up by family-related reasons behind a move, with 25% of people deciding to move because of family. Next up, involving 16% of people are employment-related reasons. Lastly, other reasons comprise 14% of the total number.

What’s interesting is that almost a third of Americans have checked climate change as a reason to move in 2022. This has caused a substantial change in relocation trends in the past decade. Many people have been negatively affected by the catastrophes caused by climate change. By the looks of the moving statistics for the year 2022, many people also checked that they would move for better weather. On the other hand, some people just needed more space for their families and moved out.

During what period do people move?

According to most researchers, the most popular time of the year for a move is summer. Which makes sense, the weather is great, school is out and the roads aren’t slippery. But if you want to be sure that you’ll get a moving quote, you definitely shouldn’t try moving from June to September. Rather, you should try moving closer to the winter when there are fewer people looking for help from professional movers, that’s what our moving industry essential statistics 2022 tell us. Then you will boost your chances of finding some good movers. Surprisingly enough, most people have moved on a Monday. That seems a bit odd since it’s a work day, but the next most popular day to move on is Friday, which makes more sense.

Moving industry economic statistics 2022

When we talk about the economy, the market size of the industry has grown by 1.8% in the year 2022. We’ve already mentioned that the annual revenue of the moving industry is $86 billion, but we didn’t mention the market size of approximately $19 billion. By that same market size, the moving industry holds 18th place in the Transporting and Warehousing industry. In accordance with moving industry statistics for 2022, it’s the 395th-largest industry in the United States. There are about 122,000 employees in the industry who have a combined payroll of something close to $3.6 billion. Worth mentioning is that the projection for the market growth from 2021 to 2026 for the moving industry is $1.95 billion, according to TechNavio.

What’s also interesting is that just 8.5% of moving businesses have more than 100 employees. On the other side, almost 50% of small moving businesses have less than 8 employees. But that small number does not account for the 482,081 that are indirectly created by the moving industry. It’s also interesting that moving companies offer their services in about 13,900 different locations around the United States of America. That’s plenty of moving discounts and deals to chase in 2022. The self-storage industry is directly linked with the moving industry and it generates an estimated $36 billion of revenue annually.

On the theme of COVID-19

We are all familiar with how the pandemic affected essentially almost every single industry negatively and cause large declines on many fronts. From the start of the pandemic, all the way to now, the industries that were affected the most by the pandemic were airlines, automobiles, hotels, and others. But how did that affect the moving industry? Well, according to the annual moving industry statistics, about 22% of Americans had moved or know someone who moved because of COVID-19. Not so surprisingly, 28% of adults mentioned that the reason why they moved is lowering the chance of contracting the virus themselves. A large number, somewhere between 14 million and 32 million Americans have reported that they plan on moving for a remote job.

Although, the pandemic has affected many of the shortages of the workforce in the industry. There has been a large shortage of drivers in the industry. Not just drivers, but there is a need for more people to do labor for professional movers. These details of the moving industry statistics for 2022 have surely caused a large increase in delivery delays and the increase in damage claims. Many of the moves have been affected by pandemic policies, some may have been canceled, and others delayed. Let’s hope all of those people know how to postpone a long-distance relocation. Hopefully, this trend does not continue and the industry finds a way out of this problem.

To finalize

This might have just been a little bit too many numbers for one day. We truly hope it has been of big help, and that you have a better understanding of the whole industry now. It was our main goal to inform you as best as we can about the moving industry statistics for 2022. So as we’ve crunched all of this information into your head, there is no way you haven’t learned something new. As they say, knowledge is power, so you show them the knowledge you’ve gained from this article! The moving industry, in spite of all of the problems caused by the pandemic, steadily continues to grow and evolve. As you’ve read, there are plenty of open jobs and opportunities in the industry, and there will always be more. Therefore, getting into the business in 2023 might not be a bad idea.