Charlotte area population statistics

[DonkeyKong]

1 minute ago, Crucial_Infra said:

So only Houston and Dallas metros grew faster than Charlotte’s. And only the city of Seattle  grew  faster than Charlotte city. 

I would say Charlotte #'s are even better since covid.  

[kermit]

Well this is interesting (even if kinda mysterious and unsourced)

 

[KJHburg]

I would speculate this:  more singles and couples only moving to Mecklenburg County while families moving to this region choose the surround the counties for various reasons including less expensive and larger homes, better public schools etc.  This leaves Meck which has the far the largest share of multifamily units to capture the singles and couples.   Most families I know moving to the region end up in the suburban counties.  

[videtur quam contuor]

I believe this was  one year anomaly. Not a trend or turning point. Census data for one year is untrustworthy for decisions. Especially a pandemic year.

[CLT Development]

1 hour ago, videtur quam contuor said:

I believe this was  one year anomaly. Not a trend or turning point. Census data for one year is untrustworthy for decisions. Especially a pandemic year.

By the way three professionals (city, state and commercial real estate researchers) and Charlotte Ledger refuted this really lazy claim by the county. Not to mention that Census was a disaster in the demagoguery that was the Trump Administration, its possible tens of thousands of people refused to answer. 

2 hours ago, KJHburg said:

I would speculate this:  more singles and couples only moving to Mecklenburg County while families moving to this region choose the surround the counties for various reasons including less expensive and larger homes, better public schools etc.  This leaves Meck which has the far the largest share of multifamily units to capture the singles and couples.   Most families I know moving to the region end up in the suburban counties.  

no reason to speculate it was bunk

Edited January 25 by CLT Development

[KJHburg]

There was this thing called Covid during the Census and many people were not going to answer a door knock from a government official.  People were trying to survive not worried about being counted.  

[CLT Development]

13 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

There was this thing called Covid during the Census and many people were not going to answer a door knock from a government official.  People were trying to survive not worried about being counted.  

was also a man threatening to deport people legally in this country

[atlrvr]

Do we even know what time period had the supposed decline?  Can't even begin to speculate without that piece of info.

Doesn't sound like census related at all, as county data was published over 2 years ago.

Edit:  I believe a lot of private party estimates rely on USPS change of address info which is released annually.

 

[kermit]

24 minutes ago, atlrvr said:

Edit:  I believe a lot of private party estimates rely on USPS change of address info which is released annually.

They do, and the USPS Master Address File is updated monthly. Unfortunately it is reporting occupied housing units, not population. The private data vendors need to estimate household size to estimate populations from the USPS address data, and HH sizes got really wacky during the pandemic.

I agree, there is little we can say about those ‘declines’ without information about the source of the data (and the time boundaries of the data). That said, the mere suggestion that Charlotte is no longer growing is an existential shift in our economic development culture.

From: https://realestate.charlotte.edu/research/2022-state-housing-report

Edited January 25 by kermit

[KJHburg]

This is fun to watch.  and yes Charlotte does make an appearance at the end of this video.  Populations of the largest US cities not metros.    Look how Charleston, Norfolk and Richmond show up decades and decades earlier than Charlotte.  New Orleans stays on the list for a long time as the dominant city in the south.  Then Houston and Dallas makes appearances and look at Los Angeles places jumps to almost the top!  Then the first Florida city that being Duval I mean Jacksonville shows up then Charlotte.   But New Orleans run is quite impressive when you think about it.    Found this on Norfolk UP site. 

 

[Take2]

If you like statistics you'll LOVE the Mecklenburg County Quality Of Life Explorer.

Trust me. I spent more hours then I should browsing... still find it interesting! 

Edited January 31 by Take2

[nicholas]

Cincinnati is interesting to watch. Went on a tear from 1820-1840, chilled for like half a century, started falling in the 1890s, and fell off the list by 1920.  Cleveland as well but was like 50 years behind in all aspects.  And Buffalo was absolutely all over the place.

[Temeteron]

It would interesting if there was a way to tally up the NYC (and NY state) diaspora that is in Charlotte.  It has to be over 200,000 for sure I’d say 

Edited January 31 by Temeteron

[videtur quam contuor]

4 hours ago, nicholas said:

Cincinnati is interesting to watch. Went on a tear from 1820-1840, chilled for like half a century, started falling in the 1890s, and fell off the list by 1920.  Cleveland as well but was like 50 years behind in all aspects.  And Buffalo was absolutely all over the place.

Buffalo had an interesting variation in population and significance. It was made by the Erie Canal which lowered shipping costs from NYC to the Great Lakes by 90+% (!). Railroads then concentrated on Buffalo as cargo moving up the St Lawrence needed to off-load due to the Niagara River and Falls. As with Montréal, the St Lawrence Seaway spelled trouble for Buffalo as cargo could go to and from central North America, Canada and U. S., all the way to Europe or anywhere short of there. Mammoth rail yards and warehouses, cold storage and all kinds of depots and shipping were now redundant. Plus the weather.

The good part of the Buffalo story was that the Falls made for outstanding power generating potential and Buffalo was the first fully electric lighted city in the world. This new power source assisted in commerce. This advantage was not long lasting, as we all know.

https://www.skny.io/ny/buffalo/fun-facts/first-city-with-electrically-lit-streets

Lesson:  technology may confer advantages that are less durable than expected.

[Windsurfer]

On 1/28/2024 at 8:25 PM, KJHburg said:

This is fun to watch.  and yes Charlotte does make an appearance at the end of this video.  Populations of the largest US cities not metros.    Look how Charleston, Norfolk and Richmond show up decades and decades earlier than Charlotte.  New Orleans stays on the list for a long time as the dominant city in the south.  Then Houston and Dallas makes appearances and look at Los Angeles places jumps to almost the top!  Then the first Florida city that being Duval I mean Jacksonville shows up then Charlotte.   But New Orleans run is quite impressive when you think about it.    Found this on Norfolk UP site. 

 

Poor Atlanta never even showed up.

 

Edited February 1 by Windsurfer

[Hushpuppy321]

What exactly are we to believe when it comes to the City Population Estimates?  World Population Review estimates Charlotte has overtaken Columbus, OH in city limit’s population but do we wait for the US Census Bureau estimate?  Some cut n paste & links noted below:

Columbus is a city located in Delaware County, Fairfield County, and Franklin CountyOhio. Columbus has a 2024 population of 917,811. It is also the county seat of Franklin County.Columbus is currently growing at a rate of 0.54% annually and its population has increased by 1.27% since the most recent census, which recorded a population of906,266 in 2020.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/columbus-oh-population

Charlotte is a city located in Mecklenburg County North Carolina. Charlotte has a 2024population of 928,154. It is also the county seat of Mecklenburg County.Charlotte is currently growing at a rate of 1.67% annually and its population has increased by6.06% since the most recent census, which recorded a population of 875,115 in 2020.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/charlotte-nc-population

Anyway - I used to be excited about Charlotte surpassing Jacksonville, FL to be most populated city in the Southeast but with their current rate of growth that may never happen…

 

 

[Richhamleigh, DC]

On 2/19/2024 at 9:38 AM, Hushpuppy321 said:

What exactly are we to believe when it comes to the City Population Estimates?  World Population Review estimates Charlotte has overtaken Columbus, OH in city limit’s population but do we wait for the US Census Bureau estimate?  Some cut n paste & links noted below:

Columbus is a city located in Delaware County, Fairfield County, and Franklin CountyOhio. Columbus has a 2024 population of 917,811. It is also the county seat of Franklin County.Columbus is currently growing at a rate of 0.54% annually and its population has increased by 1.27% since the most recent census, which recorded a population of906,266 in 2020.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/columbus-oh-population

Charlotte is a city located in Mecklenburg County North Carolina. Charlotte has a 2024population of 928,154. It is also the county seat of Mecklenburg County.Charlotte is currently growing at a rate of 1.67% annually and its population has increased by6.06% since the most recent census, which recorded a population of 875,115 in 2020.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/charlotte-nc-population

Anyway - I used to be excited about Charlotte surpassing Jacksonville, FL to be most populated city in the Southeast but with their current rate of growth that may never happen…

 

 

I take the site with a grain of salt.  For example, their entry for Durham...  https://worldpopulationreview.com/world-cities/durham-population.  There is a Durham, Ontario https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durham,_Ontario but it's not bigger than 3000 people.   I have a hard time imagining that Jacksonville, FL leapfrogged over Austin and Ft. Worth, TX to reach 1 million.  Did Jacksonville, FL annex even more territory?!

Edited February 25 by Richhamleigh, DC

[CLT2014]

One big variance between Jacksonville and Austin.... babies.

Austin is growing largely by net migration from other areas of the country. It has the third lowest fertility rate among large metros (1.53 children per childbearing aged woman, below replacement level). 

Jacksonville is growing by strong net migration from the more expensive parts of Florida and the Northeast, but is also has the highest fertility rate among any larger metro area nationwide at 2.189 children per childbearing woman (above replacement). 

Jacksonville's natural increase via births AND relocations from other areas gives it an advantage in population growth over Austin. 

Jacksonville has less overall households though, that tend to be larger (giving more slack to the real estate market). 2.47 people/ household in Jacksonville versus 2.21 in Austin. This leads to Austin having 48,000 more households out looking for a home and why real estate demand feels so much more explosive in Austin for apartments, et... Children can't buy homes and Jacksonville can pack more of its population into less homes as more people live together in Jacksonville.  

Edited February 26 by CLT2014

[Rufus]

Also, it should be noted that Jacksonville is consolidated with Duval County, whereas Austin is not with Travis County. So, the scale is different. And while communities in Duval chose to remain separate, Jacksonville not only covers a larger land (874sqmi) compared to Austin (320sqmi). Austin also got hit pretty hard during the COVID pandemic as folks moved out of cities, whereas Jacksonville, being the beach community it is and much larger in area, gained from that loss. So, I would say trust nothing until the 2030 Census numbers come out because the latter half of this decade will be a return to 2020 numbers and growth upward. Austin is still the poster child for insane growth, and I imagine it to overtake Jacksonville in the next couple years. 

[CLT2014]

In 2023 Census Estimates:

For the CSA, Charlotte is at 3,387,115 people and growing 1.65% at 19th largest in the country (between #18 Denver and #20 Portland). If Charlotte and Denver maintained their current growth, CLT would overtake Denver in 10 years. Cleveland is currently #17 and shrunk slightly. Denver should overtake Cleveland for #17 in 2 years and then CLT would overtake Cleveland in 6 years. 

On the county front, Mecklenburg grew the fastest it has this decade year over year at 1.69% to 1,163,701 people. Interestingly, this was even a slightly higher annual growth rate than the largest county in the state, Wake, that grew 1.64% in 2023. Wake has recently been growing faster than Meck at the county level. 

Edited March 14 by CLT2014

[QCxpat]

According to data released earlier today by the U.S. Census Bureau, Charlotte saw the 6th largest pop. gain of any American metro area (MSA) between 2022 - 2023.

Table 8  -   Top 10 U.S. Metro Areas in Annual Numeric Growth:
                       July 1, 2022  to  July 1, 2023

Rank	Metro Area	April 1, 2020 (Estimates Base)	July 1, 2022	July 1, 2023	Numeric Growth
1	Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX	7,637,398	7,947,439	8,100,037	152,598
2	Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, TX	7,149,604	7,370,464	7,510,253	139,789
3	Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA	6,106,847	6,238,676	6,307,261	68,585
4	Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL	2,673,391	2,763,017	2,817,933	54,916
5	Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL	3,175,291	3,291,341	3,342,963	51,622
6	Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC	2,660,348	2,754,657	2,805,115	50,458
7	Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX	2,283,379	2,423,170	2,473,275	50,105
8	Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ	4,851,102	5,020,870	5,070,110	49,240
9	San Antonio-New Braunfels, TX	2,558,115	2,655,928	2,703,999	48,071
10	Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, FL	6,138,356	6,139,812	6,183,199	43,387

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2023 Population Estimates.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Comparison of Charlotte / Raleigh / and Nashville MSAs and CSAs as of 7/1/2023

Charlotte MSA         2,805,115                            Charlotte CSA          3,387,115

Raleigh MSA              1,509,231                            Raleigh CSA               2,368,947   

Nashville MSA          2,102,573                             Nashville CSA          2,350,738    

Links:  

https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2024/population-estimates-more-counties-population-gains-2023.html

https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/demo/popest/2020s-total-metro-and-micro-statistical-areas.html

Edited March 14 by QCxpat

[KJHburg]

 

this is interesting since Brunswick County NC was added back to Wilmington MSA from Myrtle Beach MSA  to see how the 2 metros areas grew. 

op 10 U.S. Metro Areas in Annual Percent Growth: July 1, 2022 to July 1, 2023
Rank	Metro Area	April 1, 2020 (Estimates Base)	July 1, 2022	July 1, 2023	Percent Growth
1	Wildwood-The Villages, FL	129,745	144,767	151,565	4.7%
2	Lakeland-Winter Haven, FL	725,048	788,382	818,330	3.8%
3	Myrtle Beach-Conway-North Myrtle Beach, SC	351,032	383,147	397,478	3.7%
4	Ocala, FL	375,904	396,437	409,959	3.4%
5	Port St. Lucie, FL	487,660	520,873	536,901	3.1%
6	Hinesville, GA	81,429	86,314	88,804	2.9%
7	Midland, TX	175,224	177,247	182,324	2.9%
8	Spartanburg, SC	355,232	372,687	383,327	2.9%
9	Wilmington, NC	422,601	454,390	467,337	2.8%
10	Daphne-Fairhope-Foley, AL	231,768	246,531	253,507	2.8%

Edited March 14 by KJHburg

[CLT2014]

Delete

Edited March 15 by CLT2014

[KJHburg]

from Biz Journal today  Fastest growing counties in the region are in order:  Lancaster, Union, Lincoln, then Iredell  then the rest.    Charlotte metro's population growth led by these counties: Census Bureau - Charlotte Business Journal (bizjournals.com)

Charlotte-area counties are listed below in ascending order of their population percentage change between July 2022 and 2023.

Anson County

• 2023 population estimate: 21,897
• Numeric change: -61
• Percentage change: -0.3%

Chester County

• 2023 population estimate: 32,226
• Numeric change: +233
• Percentage change: +0.7%

Rowan County

• 2023 population estimate: 151,661
• Numeric change: +1,988
• Percentage change: +1.3%

Gaston County

• 2023 population estimate: 237,242
• Numeric change: +3,272
• Percentage change: +1.4%

York County

• 2023 population estimate: 298,320
• Numeric change: +4,119
• Percentage change: +1.4%

Cabarrus County

• 2023 population estimate: 240,016
• Numeric change: +4,107
• Percentage change: +1.7%

Mecklenburg County

• 2023 population estimate: 1,163,701
• Numeric change: +19,626
• Percentage change: +1.7%

Iredell County

• 2023 population estimate: 199,710
• Numeric change: +3,836
• Percentage change: +2%

Lincoln County

• 2023 population estimate: 95,675
• Numeric change: +2,567
• Percentage change: +2.8%

Union County

• 2023 population estimate: 256,452
• Numeric change: +7,280
• Percentage change: +2.9%

Lancaster County

 

• 2023 population estimate: 108,215
• Numeric change: +3,491
• Percentage change: +3.3%

[Richhamleigh, DC]

 

5 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

•  

The Census Bureau compensated MYR by making it a CSA.  How, I have no idea but it basically keeps the population where it was before Brunswick was rightly returned to ILM.   

Also interesting is how the Census Bureau in Table 8 uses the CSA population first DFW, HOU, ATL, TPA, etc. use the CSA populations.  If they had done the same for CLT, MCO, and RDU for example, that Table would be very different.

Edited March 15 by Richhamleigh, DC