Urban-suburban migration patterns in the United States, 2004-2008: the beginning of the end for suburbanization?

David A. Swanson, University of California, Riverside
Jerome McKibben, McKibben Demographic Research

The sub-prime mortgage fueled housing boom of 2003-2006 led to an acceleration of Americans moving from central city urban areas to the neighboring suburban counties. The subsequent collapse of the both the new and existing housing markets have led to a dramatic turnaround in the levels and patterns of United States short distance mobility trends. Using Internal Revenue Service county-to-county migration data from 2003 to 2008 from 19 selected metropolitan areas around the country, this paper shows that most center city counties experienced a marked improvement in their migration trends after 2006. Further, the surrounding suburban counties have seen their levels of net in-migration noticeably reduced.