You have plenty of tools available to identify the fastest-growing local markets, but it’s hard to beat population growth as a quick-and-easy metric to highlight the high flyers.
New residents to any market need places to live, shop and work, and that usually translates directly into the need for new homes, apartments, offices, stores, schools, medical building and other types of residential and commercial construction. You will find that many of the metros in this table also rank high in several other key electrical market economic indicators, including building permits, and electrical contractor employment growth.
The U.S. Census Bureau offers free data (https://www.census.gov/topics/population/data.html) on population trends at the county, metropolitan and state level that will prove helpful in your market planning. The table below (click on the green box) offers another population metric that you may find of interest — new residents per day. In 2018, the most recent data available seven Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) gained more than 100 new residents per day: Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX (+212); Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ (+200); Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL (+143); Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL (+137); Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA (+119); Las Vegas-Henderson-Paradise, NV (+105); and Austin-Round Rock, TX (+102).
Florida had seven metros amongst the nation’s leaders in new residents per day, and Texas had four when measured by this metric. No other state had more than two metros.
On the flip side, three metros saw more than 100 residents leave each day: New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ-PA (-277); Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA (-201); Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI (+161).
