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California’s exodus isn’t just billionaires — it’s regular people renting U-Hauls, too

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California’s exodus isn’t just billionaires — it’s regular people renting U-Hauls, too


It isn’t just billionaires leaving California.

Anecdotal data suggest there is also an exodus of regular people who load their belongings into rental trucks and lug them to another state.

U-Haul’s survey of the more than 2.5 million one-way trips using its vehicles in the U.S. last year showed that the gap between the number of people leaving and the number arriving was higher in California than in any other state.

While the Golden State also attracts a large number of newcomers, it has had the biggest net outflow for six years in a row.

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Generally, the defectors don’t go far. The top five destinations for the diaspora using U-Haul’s trucks, trailers and boxes last year were Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington and Texas.

California experienced a net outflow of U-Haul users with an in-migration of 49.4%, and those leaving of 50.6%. Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey and Illinois also rank among the bottom five on the index.

U-Haul didn’t speculate on the reasons California continues to top the ranking.

“We continue to find that life circumstances — marriage, children, a death in the family, college, jobs and other events — dictate the need for most moves,” John Taylor, U-Haul International president, said in a press statement.

While California’s exodus was greater than any other state, the silver lining was that the state lost fewer residents to out-of-state migration in 2025 than in 2024.

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U-Haul said that broadly the hotly debated issue of blue-to-red state migration, which became more pronounced after the pandemic of 2020, continues to be a discernible trend.

Though U-Haul did not specify the reasons for the exodus, California demographers tracking the trend point to the cost of living and housing affordability as the top reasons for leaving.

“Over the last dozen years or so, on a net basis, the flow out of the state because of housing [affordability] far exceeds other reasons people cite [including] jobs or family,” said Hans Johnson, senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California.

“This net out migration from California is a more than two-decade-long trend. And again, we’re a big state, so the net out numbers are big,” he said.

U-Haul data showed that there was a pretty even split between arrivals and departures. While the company declined to share absolute numbers, it said that 50.6% of its one-way customers in California were leaving, while 49.4% were arriving.

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U-Haul’s network of 24,000 rental locations across the U.S. provides a near-real-time view of domestic migration dynamics, while official data on population movements often lags.

California’s population grew by a marginal 0.05% in the year ending July 2025, reaching 39.5 million people, according to the California Department of Finance.

After two consecutive years of population decline following the 2020 pandemic, California recorded its third year of population growth in 2025. While international migration has rebounded, the number of California residents moving out increased to 216,000, consistent with levels in 2018 and 2019.

Eric McGhee, senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California, who researches the challenges facing California, said there’s growing evidence of political leanings shaping the state’s migration patterns, with those moving out of state more likely to be Republican and those moving in likely to be Democratic.

“Partisanship probably is not the most significant of these considerations, but it may be just the last straw that broke the camel’s back, on top of the other things that are more traditional drivers of migration … cost of living and family and friends and jobs,” McGhee said.

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Living in California costs 12.6% more than the national average, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. One of the biggest pain points in the state is housing, which is 57.8% more expensive than what the average American pays.

The U-Haul study across all 50 states found that 7 of the top 10 growth states where people moved to have Republican governors. Nine of the states with the biggest net outflows had Democrat governors.

Texas, Florida and North Carolina were the top three growth states for U-Haul customers, with Dallas, Houston and Austin bagging the top spots for growth in metro regions.

A notable exception in California was San Diego and San Francisco, which were the only California cities in the top 25 metros with a net inflow of one-way U-Haul customers.

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Northern California’s House of Clocks has stood the test of time for 55 years

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Northern California’s House of Clocks has stood the test of time for 55 years


While we may lose an hour of sleep this coming weekend, one clock store in California is gearing up for one of its busiest times of the year: daylight savings.

It’s the House of Clocks, the largest clock company in Northern California, which was recently celebrating 55 years of business.

It’s a place frozen in time. Just visit the store’s 240-year-old grandfather clock. It’s got plenty of stories to tell, dating back to 1780.

“This is the oldest piece we have right now,” clocksmith Joey Hohn said.

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The House of Clocks is on the outskirts of Downtown Lodi in San Joaquin County.

“We have new, we have vintage, we have antique,” co-owner Sandy Hohn shared. “Honestly, it feels like not a day goes by that we don’t get a phone call or an email of somebody wanting to sell something for 100 different reasons.”

The clock store has been with the Hohn family for three generations. It’s all thanks to one family heirloom.

“When the first war started, [my grandparents] left everything and had to move,” Joey Hohn explained. “After the Second World War, my grandpa was stationed in Germany. They went back to the house that had been abandoned and the neighbor who they left the property to said, ‘As far as I’m concerned, everything in the house is still yours.’ They went back and got this, so this is my great-great-grandparents’ clock.”

You can find just about anything in the House of Clocks, from old grandfather clocks to clocks that can fit in the palm of your hand.

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What you can’t find anywhere else is the Hohns’ love for Lodi.

“We’ve made so many friends over the years out of customers,” Sandy Hohn said. “Friends that are just wonderful, that love collecting, and we keep them repaired for their families, which is awesome. They have sentimental value that’s passed down.”

That same love for the city and their community runs in the family.

“We had a customer that wanted to repaint their dial,” Joey Hohn explained. “We told them no because it was her father’s who had passed away. Every time he went to wind the clock, he placed his thumb in the same spot. When we told her that smudge there on the dial was her father, she said, ‘Back away, don’t you dare.’ It was just a good memory we have.”

While you can’t turn back time, what we can do is keep memories alive and treasure the present moment.

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“There’s so many personalities,” Sandy Hohn said. “We just try to find a good home for them.”



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Signs of spring blooming at Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve after wet, warm winter

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Signs of spring blooming at Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve after wet, warm winter


It’s beginning to look a lot like spring!

The warm and wet weather this winter has led to the start of a dazzling super bloom at the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.

“We had an unseasonably warm winter as well, so there’s actually a lot of growth,” said Callista Turney with California State Parks. “We’re having early wildflowers that are already at the park. So if you look at the poppy live cam, it shows a lot of orange already.”

The rain has helped the early blooms, but it’s actually the heat that accelerated the growth of the flowers.

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“It will actually speed up the growth of the plants, so some of them were already blooming and that’s going to cause those blossoms to accelerate faster towards seed production. And the blossoms that are in the process of being formed, those are going to open up soon as well.”

We also sometimes see great super blooms in Death Valley National Park, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Joshua Tree and the Mojave National Preserve.

“It’s definitely a rare occurrence because we don’t always have the right conditions. It’s gotta be the weather, the wind, the rain, all coming together,” said Katie Tilford, Director of Development and Communications with the Theodore Payne Foundation.

If it continues to stay unseasonably warm, we’ll see a shorter bloom. The key to a longer season is milder weather.


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Republican governor candidate Chad Bianco says he’s the ‘antithesis to California state government’

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Republican governor candidate Chad Bianco says he’s the ‘antithesis to California state government’


We are counting down to the California governor’s race. Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County, is one of the two biggest names running on the Republican ticket.

In a one-on-one interview with Eyewitness News political reporter Josh Haskell, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said, “I am the antithesis to California state government because I am going to take a nuclear bomb into that building and absolutely destroy everything that they do to us behind closed doors.”

Although he’s been elected by the voters twice, Bianco says he’s not a politician — which is why he believes his campaign for California governor is resonating, as reflected in the polls.

“President Trump, in one year, from 2025 when he took over, until now, did absolutely nothing to harm California. What’s harming California is 30 years of Democrat one-party rule that have created an environment here that no one can live in anymore. They’ve only been successful here in California because we vote D no matter what. You vote D or die. I mean, that’s it. Charles Manson would be elected in California if he was the only Democrat on the ballot,” Bianco said.

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Bianco isn’t the only conservative Republican running for governor, and according to polling, he’s neck-and-neck with former Fox News host Steve Hilton.

SEE ALSO: CA governor candidate Steve Hilton says ‘everybody supports’ Trump’s immigration policies

Leading in some polls in the wide-open California Governor’s race as the June primary creeps closer is Republican and former Fox News host Steve Hilton.

“Steve has no chance of winning in November. The Democrats know that I’m going to win in November, and so they have to do everything they can to keep me out of that,” Bianco said.

When asked about the affordability crisis in the state, Bianco said, “Almost the entire issue of affordability in California is because of regulation, excessive regulation imposed by government. Every single regulation can be signed away with the governor’s signature.”

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“It is a drug and alcohol addiction problem that, and a mental health problem,” he said about the homelessness crisis. “Every single bit of money that is going to these nonprofits that say ‘homeless,’ zero money. You’re getting absolutely nothing. I can’t tell you that we would end what we see in the homeless situation within a year, but I guarantee you we would never see it again after two years.”

When challenged on that prediction, pointing to how the state doesn’t have the facilities to treat the number of people living on our streets, Bianco responded, “We have been conditioned to believe that buildings take five years to build. It takes 90 days or less to build a house, but in California, it takes three to five years because the government won’t allow it. The regulations that are destroying this state are going to be removed with me as the governor.”

Bianco also said California jails shouldn’t have to play the role of treatment facilities.

Although he says he supports the Trump administration and wants the president’s endorsement, Bianco has been traveling the state — meeting not just with Republicans, but Democrats and independents as well. He says all of our state government officials have failed.

The primary election is June 2.

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No clear front-runner in race for California governor, new poll shows

A new poll shows there’s still no clear front-runner in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom.

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