U-Haul ranks Utah No. 4 among the states for growth in 2018, measured by how many one-way, do-it-yourself movers arrive in Utah compared to how many leave.
In contrast, the U.S. Census Bureau ranked Utah No. 3 for population growth last year, and estimated that 40 percent of those new residents came from people moving to the state (and the other 60 percent was from more births than deaths). The Census Bureau also ranked Utah No. 1 in population growth during the past decade.
U-Haul said Utah jumped 21 places last year, up from No. 21 in 2017 and No. 38 in 2016.
U-Haul says its data is a gauge of how well states and cities are attracting and maintaining residents, although it says its data does not correlate directly to population or economic growth.
The company said that St. George, Hurricane and Ogden saw the biggest net gain of one-way U-Haul trucks in the state.
It said other cities with notable net gains included Logan, Tooele, Clearfield, Provo, Bountiful, Sandy, Riverton and West Jordan.
Among all cities nationally, U-Haul said St. George ranked No. 15 for net move-ins in its data. The top cities were Sacramento, followed by Spring, Texas and New York City.
Nationally, the top three states for growth in the U-Haul data were Texas and Florida, which held the top two spots for the third year in a row, followed by South Carolina. Idaho trailed Utah at No. 5.
Illinois was at the bottom of the rankings at No. 50 for the third time in four years. Others at the bottom were Michigan at No. 49 and California at No. 48.
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