Why California & Texas Buyers are Moving to Utah (AND Why Many Move Back)

Every month, I talk to families who just sold a house in California or Texas and moved to Utah. Most of them love it here. They tell you it was one of the best decisions they've ever made. And it always starts the same way. Scott, we need to talk about selling, but not all of them. A couple of times a year as well, I get a different kind of call. It's someone I helped buy a home two maybe three years ago going back and they need some help. So if you're thinking about moving to Utah from California or Texas, you deserve to hear both sides, why people come Um, and why some of them leave. The families who move back usually aren't unhappy about one big thing. It's a handful of smaller things that they didn't see coming, and almost all of them could have been caught before they ever signed a contract. There's a lot of information out there about moving to Utah and Salt Lake City and the Wasatch Front, and honestly, some of it is really confusing. Half of it makes Utah sound perfect. The other half makes it sound like a frozen parking lot. So I put this all together to make it easier for you. And that number one reason that people move back is not the snow. It's not the home prices either. It's something most people don't even think about until they're 18 months in. And I'm saving that one for the end of this video. So stick around. And if we haven't met yet, I am Scott Steele. I lead the Steele Group here in Utah, and I've spent years helping people make this exact move. Folks coming from Texas, folks coming from California and the Pacific Northwest and the East Coast and everywhere in between. And before real estate, I spent years in construction as well. So I tend to look at homes very differently than most real estate professionals. And that's going to matter in a few minutes as well. And I've got six things for you. Each one is a real reason that people choose Utah and each one has a flip side that sends some of those same people back to where they came from. We'll cover the money and write a math that looks amazing on a spreadsheet doesn't always hold up, winter and one specific month I want every buyer to see before they commit, jobs and the Silicon Slopes, the lifestyle trade-offs, and the house itself because homes here are built differently than what you're used to in Sacramento or San Antonio. Then we'll finish with that number one reason. I'm not going to try to talk you into moving here. If this video helps you figure out Utah isn't the right fit, that's a win just as well. I'd rather you find that out now than two years and two sets of closing costs down the road. Okay, let's start where almost every one of these conversations starts, and that's with a calculator. If you're coming from the Bay Area, Orange County, or San Diego, the numbers can feel like a cheat code. You sell a house worth a million two or two million dollars, maybe a million and a half, and suddenly you're looking at homes in Draper or Lehi or South Jordan where that money goes so much further. Maybe you pay cash. Maybe you take a much smaller loan. Maybe you put that equity in the bank for the first time in your life. I've watched families cut their monthly housing payment in half just by making this move. Now, Texas is a different story. Texas buyers usually aren't coming here because Utah is cheaper. A lot of the time, it isn't. They're coming for the mountains, for real seasons, a different pace of life. For them, the money conversation is really about taxes. Texas has no state income tax. Utah does. It is a flat rate, just above 4.5%, so a Texan sees that and thinks, okay. I'm going to pay more here. But then look at property tax. Depending on where you lived in Texas, you might have been paying somewhere between one and a half and 2% of your home's value every single year or even more. In Utah, the effective rate on a primary residence usually lands around half a percent, give or take. On a $600,000 home, that difference alone can be several thousand dollars per year, even 10,000 per year. For a lot of Texas families, it eats up most of the income tax difference altogether. Where does it go wrong? For California buyers, the trap is assuming that Utah is cheap. It's not. In early 2026, the statewide median sales price was about $520,000, according to the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah. For single-family homes, Utah is one of the 10 most expensive states in the country. And Salt Lake County's median single-family price hit a record $640,000 this past spring. So, is it cheaper than San Jose? Absolutely. Is it cheap? No. Here's what catches people, though. A California buyer comes in with a big equity check and because the money feels like a lot, they buy a lot. Bigger house, bigger lot, three car garage, the view lot up on the bench. Then they realize their income didn't make the move the same way that the equity did. If you kept your California salary working remote, Great. But if you or your spouse took a local job, Utah wages for a lot of roles are a little bit lower than what you made on the West Coast. Then the utility bill shows up. Heating a 4,000 square foot house through a Utah January is a very different bill than a 1,600 square foot house in Orange County with the windows open. For Texans, the sticker shock is price per square foot. The same budget that got you a big house outside of Dallas or Houston. So, here's what I tell every family coming from out of state. Don't compare home prices. Compare your total monthly life. Mortgage, property tax, insurance, utilities, HOA, commute, and your actual take-home pay here as well. Old life and new life, side by side, line by line. And the families who stay ran that math honestly before they made the move. The families who leave usually ran it on a napkin. Now money is why a lot of people start looking at Utah, but it's almost never the reason they leave on its own. What usually tips it shows up every single winter. And there's one month I really want you to see before you buy and that's coming up next. Okay, quick thing first, if this is useful, hit that subscribe button and drop a comment telling me where you're moving from and which part of Utah you're most curious about. Is it Salt Lake City? Is it Utah County? Park City? Wherever. I read every single comment and your questions and your comments help me decide what And what videos to make next. Let me take a quick pause and properly introduce myself. I am Scott Steele, and I lead the Steele Group here in Utah. My team and I help buyers and sellers every single day across Salt Lake County, Utah County, Davis and Weber Counties, and some in Wasatch Counties up in and around Park City. A big part of what we do is help people moving to Utah from out of state. And that includes the other end of this move as well, like selling the house that you're leaving and more on that at the end of the video. And because so many of you ask the same questions before you ever visit, I put together a Utah Reel, Relocation guide, the property tax basics, water basics, which school district is best for you and the main commute corridors up and down the Wasatch Front and the Wasatch back is the exact resource that I send my own relocation clients before their first visit. It's free. It's in the link in the description below or the pinned comment. Download that guide in the form of an app and save it to your home screen on your phone just like any other app. It's a wonderful tool. Ask almost anyone why they moved to Utah, and within two sentences, you'll hear the word mountains. From a lot of Salt Lake County neighborhoods, you can be at the mouth of Big or Little Cottonwood Canyon in 20 or 30 minutes. Park City is about 40 minutes from downtown Salt Lake City. Real seasons, fall in the canyons is unreal. For a lot of Texans, that's the whole reason. You're done with August, 105 degrees and air that you can wear. For Californians, it's getting seasons back without giving up the outdoors. And then January shows up. The snow isn't the hard part either. Snow in the valley usually melts off within just a day or two, and the roads get cleared really fast. The hard part is the inversion and the air. The Salt Lake Valley and Utah Valley are basically bowls with mountains on both sides. When a high pressure system parks over us in the wintertime, cold air gets trapped in the valley under a layer of warmer air, and everything we put into that air just sits there for days, sometimes a week or more on really bad years. The sky goes gray, the mountains you moved here for disappear behind a brown haze, air quality alerts go out, you might not see the sun from the valley floor for a few weeks. I've had clients from San Diego tell me that that was what broke them, not the cold, not The gray week after week, day after day in a place they move to for the views and they never saw it coming. Now there's a workaround. This typically happens only in January and February. I have a really good way to work with this with mini vacations or staycations or ski trips. It's an easy thing to plan ahead, to look forward to and to get away during those inversion seasons. And on average, we see 14 to 17 days per year of inversion days. Now, most of you find the homes between June and September and that's when everybody visits here. So here's my advice to every relocation client. Come in January or February if you can. Before you sell, before you sign anything, spend a week here during the toughest months that we have. Drive the commute you'd actually drive. Go to the grocery store at five o'clock when it's already dark and everybody just got off of work. Then do the other half of that test as well. Drive up. Inversions usually break a few thousand feet up, head up Parley's Canyon toward Park City, or up one of the Cottonwood Canyons, and a lot of the time you'll just pop right out into a blue sky and beautiful clean air. The locals who love it here have learned to get above it on the weekends. And if you come in January and still love it, you're going to be fine because if January makes you miserable, that's important information, and you got it for the price of a plane ticket instead of a house. Money and weather, but a lot of people aren't moving for either one of those. They're coming for a job or because their job finally let them work from anywhere. And that's where things can quietly go sideways, especially when only one person's career made that move. Utah's economy is one of the strongest in the country. In fact, it's ranked number one in the nation. The Silicon Slopes, that stretch of Lehi, Draper, all the way through the point of the mountain between Salt Lake City and Provo, where Salt Lake County meets Utah County, is packed with tech companies and startups. There's finance, healthcare, the outdoor industry, and Salt Lake City International Airport is easy to get in and out of for all of those places, which matters if you travel for work or fly back to headquarters a few times per year. Remote workers have been a big part of who's moving to Utah from California because of the lifestyle. Keep the coastal salary, get the Utah lifestyle. That's a great combination. But here's where it gets fragile. First, remote work isn't guaranteed forever. I've seen people called back to the office with a choice, move back or find something new to do. I've seen people called back to the office with a choice, move back or find something new. And if your role is specialized, the local market at that level can be a lot smaller than the Bay Area or Austin. Just not as many at the very top for some fields. Second, and I really want couples to hear this one. When one partner's career made the move and the others did not, I watched that really closely. One person has the job, the team, the reason they came, the other left a career or a client base behind and it's just starting over. Two years in, that gap can get really heavy between you two. And third is the commute. Homes get more affordable further out. In places like Eagle Mountain or Saratoga Springs or Syracuse up to the north, so people buy out there and then spend their mornings on I-15 or Mountain View Corridor, trying to get through the Point of the Mountain or other corridors, it's gotten better and more road work keeps coming, but at rush hour, it can still eat at your day. A 45 minute commute that you didn't plan for, both directions, five days per week. That gets old pretty fast. So before you move, three things. Have an honest backup plan if remote work changes. If you're a couple, make sure both of you have a real reason to be here and test the commute at the time that you'd actually drive it, not Saturday afternoon. Tuesday at 7.30 in the morning might be the best test. Now, next is the stuff that never shows up in a spreadsheet, the day-to-day trade-offs, and it plays out differently for California and Texas. So stick with me because one of those is going to sound exactly like you. If you like being outside, the lifestyle here in Utah is so hard to beat. I can leave my house after work and be on a trail in 15 minutes. Five national parks in this state, Bear Lake in the summer, skiing in the winter, Lake Powell. A lot of people tell me their weekends got better the day that they moved here. And for a lot of folks, the pace is the point. Errands take less time. Parks are everywhere. It's an easy place to have a normal Tuesday or Thursday afternoon. Now, the trade-offs. If you're from California, it's the ocean. People underestimate it. You don't realize how much it was part of your life until you're nine hours from the nearest beach. Usually it hits the second summer you're here. The other one is variety. Salt Lake City has a good growing food scene and the arts are better than people ever expect. But coming from LA or San Francisco, it's a different scale. Fewer options at 11 at night and things close earlier. And some state rules catch people off guard as well. Wine and spirits are sold in state-run liquor stores only, not your grocery store or liquor stores. And those stores are closed on Sundays. Not a deal breaker for most people, but it surprises a lot of newcomers. For Texans, it's more about scale. Salt Lake City is a mid-sized metro. We've got the Utah Jazz, Real Salt Lake, and now an NHL team in the Utah Mammoth, and hopefully a Major League Baseball team soon, which has been really fun. But it's not Dallas. And yes, some Texans miss the food. They miss the NFL games. And I'm not going to get into a brisket debate here on camera either Oh, and the The last one, it's really dry here, really dry. People coming from Houston are shocked by how much lotion they go through that first winter. Now, I personally love the dry air. I can't stand the air in Houston, for example, so that's just a personal preference. None of these are reasons not to come, but they add up quietly, so be honest about what you actually do on a weekend. If your best days involve trails, snow, lakes, and open space, you're going to love it in Utah. If they involve the beach or a big city night out, you can still love Utah, just go in with your eyes wide open and plan your travel. Okay, this next one is my favorite because it's where my construction background earns its keep. A lot of people who move back didn't fall out of love with Utah. They fell out of love with the house that they bought. And most of the time, that could have been caught before closing. Homes here are built for a different environment than California or Texas, and that changes what you should be looking for. First, basements. Most Texas homes sit on a slab, and a lot of California homes do as well. Here, basements are everywhere, and they're great. More square footage for the money, a guest suite, a place for the kids, a basement apartment. But a basement means you have to think about water. Where's the grading sending it? Do the window wells drain properly? Are the downspouts pushing water away from the foundation or dumping it right next to it? I've walked through beautiful finished basements and seen moisture behind the baseboards that no listing photo will ever show you. Second, soil. Parts of the Wasatch Front have clay-heavy soils that expand and contract. Settling cracks aren't automatically a problem, but you want somebody who knows which cracks are cosmetic and which ones are trying to tell you something. And third is radon gas. A lot of Utah tests elevated for radon, a naturally occurring gas that comes up out of the ground. Plenty of people moving from California or Texas have never even heard of it. It's very manageable and easy to mitigate. Test for it during the inspection. And if it's high, put in a mitigation system. And if it's me, I always negotiate this for the seller to pay for that to happen. Just know before you close. Not after fourth is water, and this one is very Utah. A lot of neighborhoods have two systems, culinary and secondary water systems, which is pressurized irrigation for your yard. Some areas have it, some don't, and it affects your bills, your landscaping and your resale value as well. Then there's new construction. A lot of out of state buyers end up in new builds in places like Herriman or South Jordan or Lehi, Saratoga Springs or Eagle Mountain. That can be a great option, but people assume new means problem free. And it doesn't. I've seen grading that sends water toward the house, framing shortcuts, finished work that looked great at the walkthrough and started falling apart in year two or three. And the builder's contract is written to protect the builder, not you. And that's not a knock on the builders. It's just how those contracts work. If you're thinking new construction, get in touch with me before you ever do so to make sure that you have proper representation to make sure that you get the home that you're expecting, that you're paying for, and that you deserve. Because when a family spends their first two years fighting a builder or drying out a basement, it colors everything. It's hard to love a place when your house is the thing that's stressing you out. So get a full inspection, even on new construction. Ask specifically about grading, drainage, radon, and the water. On a new build, get an independent inspection at pre-drywall before the walls close up because that's the only time you can see what's behind them. And work with somebody who looks past the paint and the countertops. Honestly, that's my favorite part of this job because I spent years on the other side of those walls. Okay, we've got one left and it's the one I promised you at the very beginning. The number one reason I see people move back, it's not the money, it's not the inversion, it's not the house. If you're planning a move to Utah right now, this is the one I'd think about the hardest. When people decide to move to Utah, they decide with their heads, taxes, house prices, schools, the job, the mountains, all of that matters. But the families who've moved back almost never leave because of a spreadsheet. They leave because of people. And it usually goes like this. A family moves here from Southern California or the Bay Area or from outside Dallas or Houston or San Antonio. Year one is exciting. They're unpacking, exploring, skiing for the first time, hiking every Every other weekend, it feels like a long vacation. Then around year two, The newness kind of wears off. The honeymoon period starts to exhaust itself and they realize they don't really have their people here. Grandma isn't 15 minutes away anymore. There's no one to call when a kid gets sick and both parents have to work. The group chat back home keeps going without them. Holidays mean plane tickets. A parent gets sick and suddenly the distance feels enormous. And that's the number one reason. Not the snow, not the prices, distance from the people they love, and not building a new circle fast enough to fill that gap. And the parts you can control is this. A lot of people moved to an idea of Utah instead of a specific place in Utah. They picked a house because the price was right or the photos were great. Without thinking about daily life in that exact spot, how far to the nearest park, how long to get to work, whether it's close to the things they actually like to do, where you land inside Utah matters more than people expect. Life in Holiday is very different than life in Eagle Mountain. Downtown Salt Lake City is a different experience than Draper, and Park City is its own world altogether with a different pace, busy tourist seasons, and a very different price point. Any of them can be the right answer for you, but only if it fits how you actually live. So here's what the families who stay tend to do. This is what I walk my own clients through. First, they pick an area based on daily life, not just the house, the commute, the trails, the kids activities, the grocery store, and how far the airport is if family will be visiting often. Second, they build a network on purpose and fast. In year one, they are joining something, a ski group, a running club, a church or community group, if that's their thing, a youth sports team, a pickleball league, something that puts them in the same room with the same people every week. And those are people just like you that have moved here from somewhere else. The people who wait for community to just happen are the ones who feel alone in year two and year three. Third. They plan for the family they left behind. I've had clients choose a home with a basement guest suite on purpose so that the grandparents could stay for a week at a time. A few have even helped their parents move out here after them as well. And fourth, they give it an honest window. Two winters, not one. Year one is either a honeymoon or a culture shock. And by year two, you'll know. So do those four things and your odds of staying and loving it go way up. so let's bring it all together people moving to Utah from California and Texas for real reasons the money can work the taxes can work the outdoors are incredible the economy is number one in the country and the pace of life is something a lot of people have wanted for years and some still go back for real reasons as well they ran the math on the sale price instead of their monthly life they never saw january only one of them had a reason to be here they bought the wrong house or the right house in the wrong spot and most of all they didn't plan for the distance from their people Every one of these things is something that you can test for and plan for before you make this move. So depending on where you are in all of this, here are two ways that I can help you. If you're still early and you're trying to figure out which part of Utah actually makes sense, Salt Lake County versus Utah County, Park City, whatever, which cities fit your commute, where secondary or primary water or school boundaries fall into place. That's exactly what the Utah relocation guide is for. The link is in the description below, or you can find it in the pinned comment. Download that guide, save it to your phone on your home screen, just like any other app. It's a really useful tool. And option number two, the direct path if you're further along, and you're already thinking about timing which neighborhoods to tour or how to plan that January visit. Let's just talk and start a conversation, book a free consultation, reach out to us directly, my team and I would love to be your real estate resource of choice. My contact information is in the description below. Reach out anytime, no pressure. We just wanna make sure that we help you get it right. And remember the other end of this move, if you still need to sell a house in California or Texas or anywhere else, I've built a network of agents that I trust outside of Utah in every single market. I can make sure that you have the right person working for you on both ends of this move so that the sell back home and the purchase here actually line up and that the communication between me and your other agent there is smooth. And if you live here and you're heading somewhere else, I can connect you with somebody good as well. And if this helped, subscribe to the channel, share it with whomever else you're in this decision with, and drop a comment. I really do read every single one of those. And if you're trying to figure out more about life in Utah, check out these videos next. I am Scott Steele. Thank you for being here, and I'll see you in the next one. Next one.