Bright Lights, Home City: Millennials Move Home

From a young age, Millennials are told to “Dream Big!”

Apr 19, 2015 – From a young age, Millennials are told to “Dream Big!” For Mayflower customer Ashley Luther, dreaming big meant heading to the West Coast with her now-husband after graduating college. While the bright lights of the big city provided a temporary home, after living in California for five years Ashley and her husband decided to move back to St. Louis to be closer to family as they begin to start one of their own.

This trend in Millennials returning home is known as the boomerang effect. One in four U.S. Millennials, (ages 18-34), have moved back to their hometown in the past five years, as stated in the 2015 Mayflower Movers Insight Study. Nearly 68 percent of respondents cited a desire to be closer to family, friends and significant others as their reason to move back to the town they grew up in.

According to Dr. Philip Cohen, a professor of sociology at the University of Maryland, strong parental relationships are drawing them home in larger numbers than previous generations. For those Millennials living away from home, one in three would consider moving back to their hometown at some point in their life.

Ashley and her husband both grew up in St. Louis. After college, her husband received a job offer at a law firm in Los Angeles, and Ashley decided to pursue her master’s degree at the University of Southern California. After getting married, the two began to discuss their desire to live closer to family and buy a home.

It took two years for them both to find jobs and move back to St. Louis, but the decision was worth the wait. As they are beginning to think about starting family, they knew the childcare costs in L.A. were way too expensive and that one of them would potentially have to stop working. And they wanted to be near family when they decide to have children. The cost of living in St. Louis, along with the location to family, including Ashley’s grandparents, had a big impact on their choice.

Since moving home, Ashley and her husband were able to purchase their first home while still contributing to savings. The Luthers moved with Mayflower, and were pleased when everything made it to St. Louis safely.

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