Dallas-Fort Worth’s New Residents: Where Do They Come From?

by John Egan

October 31, 2016

You could call it the Dallas-Houston shuffle.

A LawnStarter analysis of data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows Houston leads U.S. metro areas for feeding the most new residents to the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area, and vice versa. From 2009 through 2013, an average of 13,934 transplants from Houston relocated to Dallas-Fort Worth each year, while 13,359 transplants made the annual trek from Big D to the Bayou City.

You don’t need to be a math wizard to realize that Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston are exchanging an almost even number of residents every year. In the end, Dallas-Fort Worth wins this relocation contest, but not by much.

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Interstate 45 links the Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston areas.

Photo: iStock

Close in Size and Proximity

Steve Murdock, director of Rice University’s Hobby Center for the Study of Texas and former director of the Census Bureau, attributes the Dallas-Houston population swap, in part, to the two metro areas being of similar size and less than 240 miles apart. As of 2015, Dallas-Fort Worth’s population was 7.1 million, while Houston’s was nearly 6.7 million.

Furthermore, he says, both metros are growing at similar rates. Murdock points out that the Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston areas experienced the biggest population gains of any U.S. metros from 2010 to 2015, with Dallas-Fort Worth adding 676,582 residents and Houston adding 736,454.

Additionally, the economies of the Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston metros are comparable, as both are centers for the energy and financial industries, Murdock says.

Dallas and Houston are rivals on and off the field.

Photo: Flickr/AJ Guel

‘So Damn Similar’

Chris Kratovil, a Dallas attorney who’s lived in both metro areas, says the long-simmering bad blood between Big D and the Bayou City stems from the fact that “in so many ways they are so damn similar.”

“The Dallas-Houston rivalry has always struck me as a classic case of familiarity breeding contempt. Most aspects of Dallas life have a direct, clear analog in Houston,” Kratovil says.

Here are the top 15 metro areas for sending new residents to Dallas-Fort Worth, based on our analysis of 2009-13 data from the Census Bureau. The data was released in 2015.

Photo: Tripping.com

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 13,934

2. Austin, TX

Photo: DoubleTree Suites by Hilton Hotel Austin

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 8,159

Photo: Flickr/Bill Taylor

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 6,802

Photo: Flickr/Pedro Szekely

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 5,662

5. New York, NY

Photo: Flickr/Always Shooting

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 5,257

6. Chicago, IL

Photo: Flickr/Roman Boed

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 4,474

Photo: Flickr/Jody Claborn

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 3,657

8. Oklahoma City, OK

Photo: Flickr/Paul McCord Jr.

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 3,652

9. Washington, DC

Photo: Flickr/Rafael Koch Rossi

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 3,415

10. Lubbock, TX

Photo: Flickr/Texas Tech University Student Housing

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 3,346

11. Phoenix, AZ

Photo: Flickr/Texas Tech University Student Housing

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 2,905

12. Bryan-College Station, TX

Photo: Texas A&M University

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 2,836

13. Killeen-Temple, TX

Photo: U.S. Department of Defense/Cherie Cullen

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 2,799

14. San Diego, CA

Photo: Flickr/Geoff Lang

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 2,710

15. Waco, TX

Photo: Baylor University

Average number of residents who relocated per year to Dallas-Fort Worth: 2,527

Top Photo: Green Dallas