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Homebuyers are fleeing California. But one city in the state is defying the exodus trend

The capital region is defying the California exodus.

A net of more than 41,000 Californians searching for a home on Redfin over the last three months of 2022 looked to leave the state, the company reported this week, by far the highest number of any state in the nation. Among metropolitan areas, San Francisco and Los Angles were ranked first and second, respectively, in the number of Redfin users looking to relocate.

However, the Sacramento region remained the top destination on the site for people looking to buy a home in a new city, just as it was for much of 2022. About 5,700 more people looked to move here than leave between October and December, according to Redfin, placing the region ahead of other fast-growing areas such as Las Vegas, Miami and Phoenix.

The top origin for people interested in moving here was San Francisco. Nationwide, nearly 25% of Redfin users looked to move cities, a record for the site.

“The people who are buying homes are relocating at an unprecedented rate because elevated mortgage rates, still-high home prices and economic uncertainty are driving many of them — especially remote workers — to more affordable areas,” the company wrote in a blog post.

Sacramento’s median home price has dropped significantly since peaking in May 2022. The median price dropped more than 15% between May and December and now stands at $530,000, according to data from local appraiser and real estate market analyst Ryan Lundquist.

It appears much of the interest in the Sacramento region is focused on the Placer County suburbs.

Moving company U-Haul reported this week that Roseville ranked second in the nation for one-way rentals of its trucks in 2022. Roseville ranked eighth on that list the previous year.

More than 1 million people had moved out of California for other states between the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and last year, according to a Sacramento Bee analysis of census data. Texas and Arizona were the top landing spots for those who left.