Baby boomers are favoring retirement communities once again, shifting population growth across the country.
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While states like California and Arizona were popular options for boomers to settle down in after retirement in the past, the generation is now opting for more affordable areas with lower property taxes.
A report released by the Census Bureau found that nearly 750,000 Americans moved out of cities and into over 440 retirement counties like Naples, Florida, Jackson, Wyoming, and Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, between 2016 and 2017. Overall, designated retirement communities — communities that have been recognized by the state for their appeal to seniors and meet a set of requirements including low crime rates and quality healthcare — experienced a 2% increase in population growth last year.
This movement could also indicate that boomers have finally emerged from the debt that plagued many during the recession, the Wall Street Journal reports.
In a similar trend, it seems millennials are also migrating to more affordable, suburban markets. Suburban areas on the outskirts of major metros saw populations increase by 1% in 2017. While many millennials still live and work in the city, the aging group is beginning to settle down, buy homes and have children in markets that offer better cost of living, the WSJ reports.
Even with large groups moving out of the urban core, metro areas still experienced an uptick in population growth by an average 0.7% last year, driven largely by new immigrants settling into cities upon arrival, according to the WSJ.
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