Texas is popular for many reasons.
The second-largest US state is the birthplace of the iconic musician Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter as well as NFL star Michael Strahan and actresses Selena Gomez and Reneé Zellweger.
It’s also home to a beloved football team, the Dallas Cowboys, and internationally famous festivals including South by Southwest (SXSW).
Beyond its cultural significance, Texas has a reputation for its affordability, largely due to its relatively lower cost of living and absence of state income tax. This personal-finance appeal, combined with a business-friendly environment, has attracted entrepreneurs and their companies over the years.
Word has gotten out — and cities in the Lone Star State often lead lists of top places Americans are moving to.
According to a Business Insider analysis of individual-level data from the Census Bureau’s 2022 American Community Survey, over 668,300 people moved to Texas between 2021 and 2022, the most recent time period for which data is available. This makes Texas the second-most popular destination in the US for movers, just behind Florida, which had about 739,000 inbound movers during the same period.
Several celebrities are among the hordes of movers to Texas. This reflects a broader trend of wealth realignment in the United States, where even the proverbial Joneses are moving to areas where their money goes further and the weather is more favorable.
Consider supermodel Bella Hadid, who moved to Fort Worth, Texas, this year to live with her professional horseman boyfriend, Adan Banuelos. Actress Emma Stone and comedian and podcast host Joe Rogan have decamped from LA to Austin in recent years.
Many other stars have also relocated to Texas.
Business Insider has compiled a list of 14 notable celebrities and businesspeople who have moved themselves — and in some cases, their businesses — to the Lone Star State.
The list is presented in alphabetical order by last name.
Haylie Duff admitted it took a while to realize she could still have an acting career without living in LA.
A native of Texas, Duff decided with her fiancé Matt Rosenberg to pack up the kids and leave California once the pandemic hit.
At first, she was nervous that the move would hurt her career.
“I think so much of my fear of moving out of Los Angeles was that my career was there and that I would never work again or something like that,” she told Fox News Digital in 2022. “And, you know, I think this has all taught us that Zoom certainly can be a very powerful tool. And we can, you know, very luckily for me, get to continue to work from here, and I get to live near my dad. I haven’t lived, here, near my dad in a really long time.”
Scott Eastwood loves living in Texas because it “slows life down.”
The son of Clint Eastwood, Scott has been methodically building his own career, showing up in the “Fast and Furious” franchise and Guy Ritchie movies.
During his downtime in Texas, he does everything from fishing to hunting.
“I think that’s why people who come to Texas really can fall in love with it,” he told Flaunt in 2021 from his home in Austin. “There’s more community, people are more neighborly, people are nice. It slows life down a little bit. It’s not this fast-paced living in a big city like New York or Los Angeles.”
Bella Hadid said she moved to Texas for her health.
After spending most of her life jet-setting around the world trying to conquer the modeling industry, Hadid decided recently to take some time away from the spotlight.
In early 2024, she spoke to Allure about moving to Texas to focus on her mental and physical health (she was diagnosed with Lyme Disease in 2013), and be with her cowboy boyfriend Adan Banuelos.
“Just as I have styled myself for years now — which I still do — I love being able to do my own hair and makeup, be happy with how I look, and get ready with my girlfriends here in Texas,” Hadid told Allure. “We have the best time, and I never feel like I need to do too much.”
“For the first time now, I’m not putting on a fake face. If I don’t feel good, I won’t go. If I don’t feel good, I take time for myself. And I’ve never had the opportunity to do that or say that before,” Hadid added. “Now when anybody sees me in pictures and they say I look happy, I genuinely am. I am feeling better; my bad days now were my old good days.”
Since James Marsden moved to Texas, he lives closer to his mother.
The star has enjoyed visiting Austin for decades but finally decided to live there in 2020.
“I love it. I’ve been coming here for 20 years,” he told “Live with Kelly and Ryan” in 2020. “I’m much closer to my mom and everybody. I love it. It’s great.”
Keith Lee fell in love with Dallas’ restaurants.
The former mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter turned TikTok food critic has set up shop in Texas.
After living in Las Vegas, Lee relocated to Texas in November 2024. In a December video reviewing the downtown Dallas restaurant The Wicked Butcher, he revealed that he now lives in Dallas.
“One thing I do love about the Dallas food scene — we’ve been here a month, a month and a half — they do have some nice fine dining restaurants,” Lee said.
Matthew McConaughey wanted to be closer to family.
Oscar-winner Matthew McConaughey and wife Camila Alves settled in Austin in 2012 after buying a 10,800-square-foot mansion.
According to a 2024 profile in Southern Living, the move to Texas was initially because of a “family crisis,” when he needed to help his mother and two brothers. The couple decided to stay put and raise their three children there.
“Ritual came back,” McConaughey said of being back in Texas. “Whether that was Sunday church, sports, dinner together as a family every night, or staying up after that telling stories in the kitchen, sitting at the island pouring drinks and nibbling while retelling them all in different ways than we told them before.”
Elon Musk moved to Texas and brought his companies with him.
In July, Elon Musk vowed to move two of his companies, X and SpaceX, out of California and into Texas. He already moved Telsa to Texas in 2021.
In 2020, Musk announced that he had already moved to Texas himself at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council summit.
Musk has claimed to own a tiny home in Texas, and records show he bought a house in Austin in 2022.
Shaquille O’Neal has been buying up properties in North Texas.
In 2022, O’Neal bought a 5,269-square-foot home in Carrollton listed at $1,224,000 and sold it in 2024 for an undisclosed amount, though it was listed for $1.7 million, according to Realtor.com.
That year, Chexy Trust, tied to the Carrollton purchase, bought a 4,670-square-foot home in Rockwall County. In 2024, O’Neal opened a branch of his Big Chicken chain restaurant in Fort Worth.
As his footprint in the region grows, he told WFAA he plans to make the area his home base.
“I’m 75% going to move here full time,” O’Neal said in June. “I have to see what’s going on with TNT next year, but based on that, you’ll probably be seeing a lot more of me.”
Glen Powell got tired of the lack of freedom living in Los Angeles.
The “Twisters” star, who is also a native Texan, moved back to Austin from Los Angeles recently to be close to his family and for his own mental health.
“When all you do is consume movies and entertainment, you could become a little self-aware and maybe derivative of yourself,” Powell told USA Today. “Your personal life, there’s no sort of freedom there, there’s storytelling around that, and I feel like that’s just not good for you on the long term.”
Jared Padalecki has a soft spot for Austin.
Padalecki ditched Hollywood for Texas before it was a trend. The “Supernatural” star, a San Antonio native, relocated from Los Angeles to Austin with his wife, Genevieve, in 2012.
In an Instagram video taken on Austin’s 24th Street in 2020, he explained why he loves the city so much.
“Austin brings me a warmth and a happiness and a peace that I have been unable to find anywhere else in my travels,” Padalecki said. “I love being here.”
Joe Rogan ended up in Texas once the pandemic hit.
Like many other celebs, Rogan left Los Angeles once the pandemic hit.
In a 2023 episode of his popular podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” he explained why he ended up in Texas.
“Then we went to the lake, and people are playing music and jumping in the water,” said Rogan, adding that his kids “were like, ‘We want to live here!'”
“That was it. Two months later, I lived here,” he said in the podcast episode.
Jamie Lynn Sigler has felt more connected to her craft since moving to Texas.
“The Sopranos” star moved to Austin in 2021 with her family, husband Cutter Dykstra, and sons Beau and Jack.
“I almost feel more connected to my craft and why I love acting,” Sigler told The New York Times in 2021. “When the calls come in, it’s a beautiful surprise. I’m still on things and I’m still a businesswoman and it’s still my career, but I don’t feel the pressure around it because we took a stand for ourselves and we made decisions for our families.”
Emma Stone moved to Texas after the birth of her child.
Stone, who gave birth to her first child in 2021, was looking to settle down away from the grind of California life.
In 2022, the two-time Oscar winner and her husband, David McCary, bought a several-million-dollar, four-bedroom property on 1.2 acres in Austin, according to celebrity real-estate website Dirt.com, which is now part of Robb Report.
James Van Der Beek wanted to get his kids out of LA.
A year after renewing his vows with his wife, Kimberly, in Austin, the “Dawson’s Creek” star moved the whole family there.
They now live on a 36-acre property.
“We wanted to get the kids out of Los Angeles,” Van Der Beek told Austin Lifestyle in 2021. “We wanted to give them space and we wanted them to live in nature.”
