Looking To Flee NYC? These Cities Will Pay You To Move

NEW YORK CITY — A nice moving bonus could await New Yorkers looking to join the pandemic exodus from the city and work remotely.

There’s Savannah, Georgia’s offer of $2,000 to help cover the moving fees of tech workers’ tempted to go south.

Another remote worker program in Tulsa, Oklahoma shells out $10,000 grants for people who make the move and stay a year.

And a Topeka, Kansas program is offering $10,000 to remote workers who move there — and up to $15,000 for those who find a local job.

Mid-size cities across the country are stepping up efforts to entice workers from New York City, Los Angeles and other big cities. Many programs existed before the pandemic, but local economic development officials behind them found the rise of remote work has made their proposition — move here and we’ll pay you — an easier sell.

“It really did supercharge the equation,” said Bob Ross, senior vice president with the Greater Topeka Partnership, which runs the ChooseTopeka program.

‘The best of both worlds’

Madeline Kelley spent six years in Williamsburg before Tulsa lassoed her.

She loved her job with Ellevate Network, a women’s organization, but living in New York City started to wear on her.

Then, Kelley discovered Tulsa Remote — a program that offers $10,000, largely no-strings-attached, for people to move there and work remotely. She pitched her bosses, they agreed and she made Oklahoma her home about two years – and hasn’t looked back.

Tulsa, she said, is a “progressive, really cool” city with a vibrant arts and cultural scene and great dining options. It also isn’t as crowded or mentally taxing as New York City can be, she said.

“It sort of lets you have the best of both worlds,” she said.

Kelley moved before the pandemic, but she could soon be joined by other New York City ex-patriots.

The coronavirus accelerated a trend of mid-size cities like Tulsa, Topeka and Bentonville, Arkansas to offer cash incentives to New Yorkers and other big city residents that relocate, said April Mason, president of the public relations firm Violet PR that specializes in economic development marketing.

“This was beginning to happen before the pandemic because of the need for well-educated talent across a number of Midwestern and Southern communities, but COVID has accelerated the trend because many professionals can now work remotely from anywhere,” she said.

The exodus from New York City during the coronavirus crisis — which drew backhanded criticism from Mayor Bill de Blasio on down — has also highlighted that living in the “greatest city in the world” isn’t always a picnic. Or affordable.

Kelley still regularly returned to New York City to visit family or for work after her move to Tulsa — or at least until the coronavirus pandemic struck. But she said it’s nice to live in a place like Tulsa, where she can live by herself in a one-bedroom home that doesn’t break the bank like her two-bedroom Williamsburg apartment.

Ross said many recent applicants to the ChooseTopeka program have mentioned that the cost of living in a big city isn’t worth the quality of life during a pandemic. He said a Palo software developer who recently moved to Topeka bought a historic “dream home” at much, much less than the $4 million he was eyeing for a California home.

“He actually ended up buying a house for $75,000,” he said, though he noted with a laugh that’s an almost unheard of deal even in a city with a median home price of $145,000.

‘A renaissance’

It may surprise many New Yorkers, but there are good places to live outside the five boroughs.

Ross grows excited when he talks about the Kansas River winding through Topeka, the city’s vibrant downtown and innumerable food offerings from “French, Indian, Thai, Vietnamese, you name it.”

Topeka was founded by abolitionists, houses the Brown v. Board of Education museum and has inclusion, equity and social justice in its DNA, he said. Many people on the coasts see it as “red state” flyover country, but it’s so much more, he said.

“We really tried to educate people on how richly diverse and amazing this community is,” he said.

Likewise, Ben Stewart, who heads Tulsa Remote, talks about a “renaissance” in his city’s art, food and cultural scenes. He points out the new Gathering Place park is designed by the same person behind Brooklyn Bridge Park.

The city is an emerging tech hub — the type of worker that comprises more than 40 percent of Tulsa Remote’s program, he said. About 50 percent of the program’s applicants hail from New York and California, he said.

“The rest really run the gamut — we’ve had a Harlem globetrotter, a Japanese opera singer,” he said.

Kelley said people accepted after the program’s application find themselves with an instant group of friends. She’s been trying to expand it by drawing in her New York City friends.

“People would come and visit me and say, ‘I get it now,’” she said.

Click here for more information on ChooseTopeka.

More information about Tulsa Remote can be found here.

This article originally appeared on the New York City Patch