Housing's Comeback Kid: The Midwest

Since 2010, the momentum of population growth has shifted away from America's expensive "superstar" cities toward smaller, secondary cities, mostly in the Midwest.

Last year, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco and San Jose all saw distinct increases in out-migration; San Jose was found to be the worst of the 53 metros with populations of more than 1 million people, The Daily Beast reports. Demographer Wendell Cox says that over the past seven-plus years, Columbus, Des Moines, Indianapolis, and Kansas City have more millennial population growth than Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, or San Jose.

New York City’s population growth, impressive earlier in this decade, now ranks among the lowest in the nation. Brooklyn, the reinvented hipster capital, last year suffered its first population decline since 2006. The same can be said of Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Chicago. None grew faster than 0.6 percent last year, the national growth rate for the 107 largest metro areas, are often by a wide margin. The burgeoning populations in places like Des Moines, which grew by 1.76 percent last year, is being driven by domestic out-migration from the superstar cities.

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