Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum

potatocoins wrote:I don't really spend time in either of those suburbs, but it seems like houses are priced relatively well (compared to suburbs in the north). Of course, I'd imagine jobs, schools, amenities are going to be better in other suburbs, but places like Mesquite and Garland seem like good options for people looking in a lower price range.

Not everyone wants to pay 400k to live in a "transitional" or gentrifying neighborhood. I was looking at houses online with a coworker about a year ago and every time he found a nice new or renovated home in Dallas around 400k, he balked when he saw the street view of the neighborhood. He has a very nice home in Euless now and he loves his neighborhood.

I've always thought of myself as a "city" person, but I took Dallas off my list for a house years ago.

I'm still skeptical of the decline shown by the census though.

Me too, not that I don't believe it exists, but that it has more to do with a decreasing number of people per unit (ie: kids graduating, old people dying) than with specific desirability of any particular city. The number of new units being constructed also point to lower occupancy per unit, so it will take a boatload of units in Dallas proper to really grow the population.

2021 city population estimates released today by the Census Bureau:

Metroplex cities 50,000 and above:
Dallas population: 1,288,457, down 14,777 (-1.13%) from 2020.
Fort Worth: 935,508, up 12,916 (+1.4%)
Arlington: 392,786, down 1,199 (-0.3%)
Plano: 288,253, up 1,585 (+0.55%)
Irving: 254,198, down 2,675 (-1.04%)
Garland: 242,035, down 3,443 (-1.40%)
Frisco: 210,719, up 7,933 (+3.91%)
McKinney: 202,690, up 5,568 (+2.82%)
Grand Prairie: 197,347, up 1,016 (+0.52%)
Denton: 148,146, up 5,844 (+4.11%)
Mesquite: 147,691, down 1,989 (-1.33%)
Carrollton: 133,251, down 158 (-0.12%)
Richardson: 116,382, down 1,410 (-1.2%)
Lewisville: 112,944, up 608 (+0.54%)
Allen: 106,874, up 1,246 (+1.18%)
Flower Mound: 77,243, up 913 (+1.2%)
Mansfield: 74,368, up 1,590 (+2.18%)
North Richland Hills: 70,209, down 101 (-0.14%)
Rowlett: 63,671, up 928 (+1.48%)
Euless: 60,500, down 605 (-0.99%)
DeSoto: 55,729, down 345 (-0.62%)
Little Elm: 51,042, up 3,964 (+8.42%)
Grapevine: 50,872, up 116 (+0.23%)

Major Texas Cities:
Houston: 2,288,250, down 11,777 (-0.51%)
San Antonio: 1,451,853, up 13,626 (+0.95%)
Austin: 964,177, up 1,056 (+0.11%)
El Paso: 678,415, down 183 (-0.03%)
Corpus Christi: 317,773, down 79 (-0.02%)

Expected these kinds of numbers, still sucks to see. I'm glad Fort Worth continues growing by leaps, people must be realizing it's secretly the better city.

Austin's number is kind of surprising. I know their metro see's heavy growth up north like we do, but for all the towers they're rapidly building I would have expected the city proper to see more than just 1,000 new residents in a single year. It's a big step down from the 16,000 they added the year before.

FW adding 12,000 in that same time is really impressive considering they have roughly a similar size and population to Austin. The difference between them is down to ~30,000, so FW might actually be on track to be the bigger city again.

Also, FW actually had a better growth rate than Tarrant County as a whole. +1.4% compared to +0.56%.
This is the opposite of Dallas, where the county did better than the city (Both still shrunk, but the county just shrunk by a smaller rate than the city).

Both Houston and Dallas need a lot more density as these large cities are still mostly comprised of single house neighborhoods. Dallas needs about 5 Uptowns within it's city limits to move the population up.

It's interesting that Addison was about the only inner ring suburb to see a sizable population increase.

Not surprising though, because despite being mostly built out, it's been in a tear with new multi-family developments.

I don't quite understand the negative numbers for Dallas. I get that the city of Dallas is pretty big, so are there are just parts of Dallas that are on the decline and people are moving away?

I moved from Turtle Creek to Lake Highlands and, as far as I can see, more density is being built in quite a few places and cost of living continues to keep rising (presumably because supply isn't keeping up with demand). Where exactly is the population decrease occurring?

Where exactly is the population decrease occurring?

You can use this map: ARCGIS to track declines from 1940-2019. I looked around and didn't see any census-designated areas higher than 5k units.
https://usg.maps.arcgis.com/apps/instan ... e6d36c7207
The map also has graphs on the side so you can see the increase/decrease per decade.

This twitter feed https://twitter.com/NeighborsDTX also details population changes around Dallas, like for example this tweet:
https://twitter.com/NeighborsDTX/status ... 7448017922 which says the population of North Oak Cliff has decreased by 8000 people since 2000, with only 500 housing units added.

Preston Hollow has also lost 50 housing units since 2000 per another tweet.
Lakewood lost 60 housing units since 2000 per another tweet.

I have no idea how accurate the map or tweets are.

Ft Worth's core losses are worse than Dallas'.

Thanks for sharing, that's a lot more helpful to see. I'll take a look at your links when I get a chance.

Fort Worth's growth is all in it's northern burbs that are within the city limits. Cheaper housing than other areas and plenty of room to grow and grow. Dallas just doesn't have that room to do that and I honestly don't think it should. We will hopefully be filling in places left vacant to become more dense.

The_Overdog wrote:

Where exactly is the population decrease occurring?

You can use this map: ARCGIS to track declines from 1940-2019. I looked around and didn't see any census-designated areas higher than 5k units.
https://usg.maps.arcgis.com/apps/instan ... e6d36c7207
The map also has graphs on the side so you can see the increase/decrease per decade.

This twitter feed https://twitter.com/NeighborsDTX also details population changes around Dallas, like for example this tweet:
https://twitter.com/NeighborsDTX/status ... 7448017922 which says the population of North Oak Cliff has decreased by 8000 people since 2000, with only 500 housing units added.

Preston Hollow has also lost 50 housing units since 2000 per another tweet.
Lakewood lost 60 housing units since 2000 per another tweet.

I have no idea how accurate the map or tweets are.

Ft Worth's core losses are worse than Dallas'.

The explanation for Preston Hollow is easy (2019 Tornado).

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:Expected these kinds of numbers, still sucks to see. I'm glad Fort Worth continues growing by leaps, people must be realizing it's secretly the better city.

Better?? I do think Fort Worth is the better city to buy a home. Not only is there ample land in Fort Worth to build new neighborhoods, but you can still find a home for a much more affordable price in a better neighborhood than in Dallas.

But "better"...I lived in Fort Worth and I can say this...I've never lived in a more boring city. Even in "bustling" areas, there is still something strangely off. Barhopping, shopping, eating out all seem lackluster in Fort Worth and I don't know why. I was just happy to leave.

I remember a coworker who moved here from Memphis said since Austin and Fort Worth were about the same size and he heard Fort Worth was "happening", he went out in Fort Worth thinking it would be like Austin and boy was he disappointed!

vman wrote:

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:Expected these kinds of numbers, still sucks to see. I'm glad Fort Worth continues growing by leaps, people must be realizing it's secretly the better city.

Better?? I do think Fort Worth is the better city to buy a home. Not only is there ample land in Fort Worth to build new neighborhoods, but you can still find a home for a much more affordable price in a better neighborhood than in Dallas.

But "better"...I lived in Fort Worth and I can say this...I've never lived in a more boring city. Even in "bustling" areas, there is still something strangely off. Barhopping, shopping, eating out all seem lackluster in Fort Worth and I don't know why. I was just happy to leave.

I remember a coworker who moved here from Memphis said since Austin and Fort Worth were about the same size and he heard Fort Worth was "happening", he went out in Fort Worth thinking it would be like Austin and boy was he disappointed!

I wouldn't exactly say Fort Worth is the *better* place to buy a home either.

If you're seeking affordability, then maybe. But home values tend to hold up better in areas that are already built out, versus those that are still developing because owners are not competing with new construction.

vman wrote:Better?? I do think Fort Worth is the better city to buy a home. Not only is there ample land in Fort Worth to build new neighborhoods, but you can still find a home for a much more affordable price in a better neighborhood than in Dallas.

But "better"...I lived in Fort Worth and I can say this...I've never lived in a more boring city. Even in "bustling" areas, there is still something strangely off. Barhopping, shopping, eating out all seem lackluster in Fort Worth and I don't know why. I was just happy to leave.

I remember a coworker who moved here from Memphis said since Austin and Fort Worth were about the same size and he heard Fort Worth was "happening", he went out in Fort Worth thinking it would be like Austin and boy was he disappointed!

All totally fair Just from personal experience I've enjoyed any time I've spent there, but I haven't lived there.

The side by side numbers between Austin and Fort Worth are really interesting though.
Roughly the same number of people there (only 3% difference), roughly the same physical size (FW only about 8% more land), and both had the same growth rate over the past decade (~+24%). Similar amounts of people wanting to fill up a similar sized city but the median home price is literally double in Austin than that of Ft Worth's. A 100% greater median home value in a city where the median income level is only about 25% greater.

That extra 8% undoubtedly makes a difference, but I imagine it's mostly attributable to the tech wealth of the people who moved to Austin sending values skyrocketing.

Fort Worth always feels like it's Sunday. Just quieter and slower than you'd expect.

vman wrote:Better?? I do think Fort Worth is the better city to buy a home. Not only is there ample land in Fort Worth to build new neighborhoods, but you can still find a home for a much more affordable price in a better neighborhood than in Dallas.

Through the years I've had numerous colleagues with high paying jobs in Dallas that lived in Fort Worth. Primarily in Tech/Finance.

They either moved to FT. Worth not really knowing much about the DFW job landscape or grew up there. I always heard the Tarrant County folks complain how all the jobs go to Dallas, Irving, Frisco, Plano.

In that regard, Ft Worth just ain't it. And I would think twice about purchasing there for that reason alone.

The running joke within my colleagues was referring to Fort Worth as Fort Worthless.

Told to me in the men's room of an Arlington restaurant around 40 years ago:

Q: What's the one thing Fort Worth has that Dallas doesn't?

A: A major city 30 miles away.

Some things never change....

Again, if this data is based on census, I'm not surprised to see drops in city proper populations given known undercounts in Latino and Black populations. I don't care as much about the 'negative' headlines; what I do care about is not getting our requisite share of state or Fed funding based on those likely faulty numbers.

Dallas County shrinks as North Texas’ population grows, census says
Census data reports that Dallas County’s population has dropped while almost all urban counties across the state grew.

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2022/07 ... nsus-says/

Has literally any part of the county become more affordable? If there's 25,000 people's worth of less demand on the current housing stock, wouldn't that lower prices somewhere?

It's an amazing achievement for Dallas County. While the state is being flooded with newcomers and the regional population grows by leaps and bounds Dallas County is losing people. And that's even with all of the building going on in the city center. All of that development and the county still loses people.

Seems to be happening everywhere, 8 out of the 10 largest US cities lost population: NY, LA, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, San Diego, Dallas and San Jose. Only San Antonio and Phoenix gained residents between 2020-2021

Two demographers and one census manager I know are pretty sure an undercount happened in the cities. The count is what it is, though, and will not be changed.

Why is this in the news now? Weren't these county population estimates released in March?

At a time when there are more housing units than ever in Dallas, and probably the highest occupancy % we have seen in decades. Rental and purchase inventory at all time lows. Doesn't make any sense.

Is it just cyclical, like households maturing and their children flying the coop?

Matt777 wrote:At a time when there are more housing units than ever in Dallas, and probably the highest occupancy % we have seen in decades. Rental and purchase inventory at all time lows. Doesn't make any sense.

Is it just cyclical, like households maturing and their children flying the coop?

Probably some of that, plus overall fewer families, more singles/couples? I wonder if Dallas County has skewed younger in recent years? Maybe?

Matt777 wrote:At a time when there are more housing units than ever in Dallas, and probably the highest occupancy % we have seen in decades. Rental and purchase inventory at all time lows. Doesn't make any sense.

Is it just cyclical, like households maturing and their children flying the coop?

Just because Dallas is filling apartments and housing stock is low doesn't necessarily mean the city population is growing. It's pretty simple math. If more people move out, than move in...no matter how large the moving in number is...you're still losing people. I was talking with a friend about homebuying a few month ago. I moved from downtown to Las Colinas about 9 years ago. And since that time , every friend of mine, except one, that purchased a home, purchased a home NOT in Dallas.

The major metros appear to have common issues, I don't think Dallas is any different. People see it and choose to live somewhere else.

Probably some of that, plus overall fewer families, more singles/couples?

Yes this, and household sizes are shrinking. If Dallas was less desirable, prices would be falling. The number of people per unit is shrinking. My own neighborhood went from 5000 people per sq mile to 3000 per sq mile just with the difference in number of people per house in ~20 years.

If we could develop south of the river with denser developments and also new housing further south we could move the needle but as it stands we have a southern sector that isn't being fully utilized. Taking that into consideration it is amazing that we have the numbers as is.

Cbdallas wrote:If we could develop south of the river with denser developments and also new housing further south we could move the needle but as it stands we have a southern sector that isn't being fully utilized. Taking that into consideration it is amazing that we have the numbers as is.

Good point, Dallas has a ton of land that could be turned into residential housing but its all basically out away from the city so very suburban like the University Hills development. Problem is the city is screwed up enough that the prospect of that actually coming to fruition seems remote at best.

The thing about all this land south of downtown, Mayor Ron Kirk talked about that when he was mayor back in the 90's, thats how long the city has been talking about it and not actually doing anything about it.

itsjrd1964 wrote:North Texas population explodes past 8 million — and counting

https://fortworth.culturemap.com/news/c ... vernments/

Just to be clear, this is the 16-county "North Texas" region, covered by the NTCOG. This covers more land than the DFW metro area.

Tucy wrote:

itsjrd1964 wrote:North Texas population explodes past 8 million — and counting

https://fortworth.culturemap.com/news/c ... vernments/

Just to be clear, this is the 16-county "North Texas" region, covered by the NTCOG. This covers more land than the DFW metro area.

I meant to add that in the post. Thanks for pointing that out.

Also, multi-generational housing aka higher density of people in one home, is now traditionally in the hands of minorities that do not participate well in the Census. Fear or just by the lack of census staff to adequately cover areas of the city affects things heavily. You can easily get a college kid to go house hopping in Frisco for confirming population much easier than you can in South Dallas. I personally have worked with Census members when I was working in leasing, and it was a huge chore that I hated doing, and most apartment staff will find ways of avoiding the census staff. Census staff doesn't show up with a sheriff and force staff to hand over occupancy data. They ask over and over and over if they can confirm some things, and it takes a very nice leasing agent to sit down and go through pages of occupancy data. Not to mention admitting who is in current units is private info so depending on the property manager, they can be nervous about working with the census depending on their politics.

itsjrd1964 wrote:North Texas population explodes past 8 million — and counting

https://fortworth.culturemap.com/news/c ... vernments/

Pretty wild that it's more than the state of Washington. So, if NTX were a state it would be the 13th most populous.
Next on the list is Virginia but that's a ways away with 8.6 million.

New county numbers are out:
https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2023/population-estimates-counties.html

Dallas rebounded but has not fully recovered from 2020-2021.
Tarrant still remains strong. Kaufman and Rockwall rates continue to be bonkers. Collin and Denton continue to be Collin and Denton.

Glad to see a rebound for Dallas County. I really think COVID hit a lot of communities pretty hard which lead to that decline.

R1070 wrote:Glad to see a rebound for Dallas County. I really think COVID hit a lot of communities pretty hard which lead to that decline.

We can prob add up the counties to see what the metro population is as well.

R1070 wrote:

R1070 wrote:Glad to see a rebound for Dallas County. I really think COVID hit a lot of communities pretty hard which lead to that decline.

We can prob add up the counties to see what the metro population is as well.

Good idea. They say they won't put out the metro numbers until May but presumably we can add our 11 metro counties up... It's 11 right? Dallas through Wise?

Well, after attempting it I see little discrepancies in what was put in press releases in years past and what I'm getting when I add up the counties in today's datasheet. I assume I'm doing something wonky. But honing in on today's data sheet gives a good idea of general metro growth over the past two years.

Adding up our 11 metro counties I got a population of 7,943,685. (That means we are likely at 8 million right this second!)
Using the same method, for the previous year I get a pop of 7,773,289.
And again for the year before that, 7,665,875.

That's a recent growth of +170,396. (+2.19%)
And that makes previous year's growth at +107,414 (+1.4%) (+97,290 is what the census reported for that year)

Assuming a similar sized error on my part I'm gonna guess a ~+155,00 metro growth rather than 170,000. But that would still make it one of the largest growth periods in years.

Well I went ahead and did the same for every Texas metropolitan area; added up their respective counties. So if I'm making any mistake I'm making the same mistake across all of them, therefore the relative differences between them all should be accurate lol.

Metropolitan Area 2021-2022
Dallas: 7,943,685 | +170,396 (+2.19%)
Houston: 7,340,118 | +124,281 (+1.72%)
San Antonio: 2,655,342 | +50,411 (+1.94%)
Austin: 2,421,115 | +62,985 (+2.67%)
McAllen: 888,367 | +7,734 (+0.88%)
El Paso: 872,195 | +820 (+0.09%)
Killeen: 496,228 | +9,368 (+1.92%)
Brownsville: 425,208 | +2,084 (+0.49%)
Corpus Christi: 446,572 | -878 (-0.2%)
Beaumont: 393,575 | -1,641 (-0.42%)
Lubbock: 328,283 | +2,949 (+0.91%)
Longview: 221,264 | +2,330 (+1.06%)
Waco: 266,836 | +3,122 (+1.18%)
Bryan-College Station: 277,824 | +5,183 (+1.9%)
Amarillo: 271,171 | +1,318 (+0.49%)
Laredo: 267,780 | +147 (+0.05%)
Tyler: 241,922 | +4,808 (+2.03%)
Abilene: 179,308 | +1,479 (+0.83%)
Midland: 171,999 | +3,793 (+2.25%)
Odessa: 160,869 | +105 (+0.07%)
Wichita Falls: 149,299 | +294 (+0.2%)
Texarkana: 134,587 | -203 (-0.15%)
Sherman: 143,131 | 3,570 (+2.56%)
San Angelo: 120,422 | -359 (-0.3%)
Victoria: 117,902 | +61 (+0.05%)


I'll probably still be looking at this data for a while. I'll post anything else that pops out to me.

Awesome job! Thanks for taking the time to do this.
When I was accessing the spreadsheet I couldn't see the county names to know which is which.

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:Well I went ahead and did the same for every Texas metropolitan area; added up their respective counties. So if I'm making any mistake I'm making the same mistake across all of them, therefore the relative differences between them all should be accurate lol.

Metropolitan Area 2021-2022
Dallas: 7,943,685 | +170,396 (+2.19%)
Houston: 7,340,118 | +124,281 (+1.72%)
San Antonio: 2,655,342 | +50,411 (+1.94%)
Austin: 2,421,115 | +62,985 (+2.67%)
McAllen: 888,367 | +7,734 (+0.88%)
El Paso: 872,195 | +820 (+0.09%)
Killeen: 496,228 | +9,368 (+1.92%)
Brownsville: 425,208 | +2,084 (+0.49%)
Corpus Christi: 446,572 | -878 (-0.2%)
Beaumont: 393,575 | -1,641 (-0.42%)
Lubbock: 328,283 | +2,949 (+0.91%)
Longview: 221,264 | +2,330 (+1.06%)
Waco: 266,836 | +3,122 (+1.18%)
Bryan-College Station: 277,824 | +5,183 (+1.9%)
Amarillo: 271,171 | +1,318 (+0.49%)
Laredo: 267,780 | +147 (+0.05%)
Tyler: 241,922 | +4,808 (+2.03%)
Abilene: 179,308 | +1,479 (+0.83%)
Midland: 171,999 | +3,793 (+2.25%)
Odessa: 160,869 | +105 (+0.07%)
Wichita Falls: 149,299 | +294 (+0.2%)
Texarkana: 134,587 | -203 (-0.15%)
Sherman: 143,131 | 3,570 (+2.56%)
San Angelo: 120,422 | -359 (-0.3%)
Victoria: 117,902 | +61 (+0.05%)


I'll probably still be looking at this data for a while. I'll post anything else that pops out to me.

Those numbers check out, but one possible caveat will be whether the OMB decides to lump Hood and Somervell Counties back in with the Dallas-Fort Worth MSA again, as that would be enough to nudge us over 8 million.

They did so once before in 2013, and then they both got removed again before the 2020 census.

Now, the real million dollar question will be whether the Dallas-Fort Worth CSA has finally surpassed Boston's CSA.

According to my math, as of 2022, they both stand with the following:

DFW CSA = 8,455,402
Boston CSA = 8,437,768

It will depend on Windham County, CT's 2022 numbers which are unknown right now (it was 117K in 2021), but unless it grew by like 18K people (highly unlikely), DFW's CWA lost counties or more counties have been added to Boston's CSA, DFW should have overtaken it for 6th place.

BTW, the new Nielsen ratings for TV should be interesting as well. We should formally surpass Philadelphia to become the 4th largest market in the US.

It was hella tedious but I dug more into MSA growth using the same method.
Texas MSAs:

United States MSAs:

If I ever feel bothered to do it I'll tackle the next 20 largest MSAs as well.

And just as a thought experiment (not as an actual expectation), here is when we would pass Chicago's MSA if we gained 170,000 people every year and they lost 77,000 people ever year: 2029

If we include Hood and Somervell counties, it would happen in 2028.
And for funs, if we glob Grayson County/Sherman onto our MSA then it would happen in 2027.

Also of note is I believe these are the first Census Bureau numbers that put Texas past the 30 million mark. It suggests the state added half a million people in that time frame, while California lost 100,000. Holding those rates would put Texas passing California in 2037 when we both hit the 37.5 million mark.

Thanks for sharing, I'm liking what I am seeing!

Crazy to think we could surpass Chicago in the next decade. I know we can't just cherry pick a single year and make a trend out of it, but it does look like Chicago's MSA is well within reach. I'm also loving all the great growth I'm seeing for so many Texas MSA's, particularly the biggest ones (Houston, Austin, and San Antonio).

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:...They say they won't put out the metro numbers until May ...

And here May is:
"Large Southern Cities Lead Nation in Population Growth" - https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2023/subcounty-metro-micro-estimates.html

It seems I did all my math right because all my metro area population estimates above line up exactly with what the bureau put out. So nothing new there, but there are new city-proper numbers here, link opens an excel file:
https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/tables/2020-2022/cities/totals/SUB-IP-EST2022-ANNRNK.xlsx

New York 8,335,897 (-123,104, -1.46%)
Los Angeles 3,822,238 (-15,748, -0.41%)
Chicago 2,665,039 (-32,990, -1.22%)
Houston 2,302,878 (+11,223, +0.49%)
Phoenix 1,644,409 (+19,053, +1.17%)
Philadelphia 1,567,258 (-22,222, -1.4%)
San Antonio 1,472,909 (+18,889, +1.3%)
San Diego 1,381,162 (+6,678, +0.49%)
Dallas 1,299,544 (+8,833, +0.68%)
Austin 974,447 (+5,104, +0.53%)
Jacksonville 971,319 (+14,408, +1.51%)
San Jose 971,233 (-10,233, -1.04%)
Fort Worth 956,709 (+19,170, +2.04%)


Dallas was, as of july last year, 4,097 people shy of recovering from the 2021 loss.
Fort Worth continues to impress, steadily gained 33,000 in two years.
Arlington has been relatively flat for those two years.
Austin feeling like Dallas--their metro grew by 2.67% but the city itself only 0.53% which is smaller than our 0.68%. All their growth is in the burbs just like us.

And here are all of the metro numbers for anyone who wants them, also an excel file:
https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/datasets/2020-2022/metro/totals/cbsa-est2022.csv

North Texas metro areas lead nation in population growth
New Census data shows the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metro area gained over 170,000 residents last year, the biggest population increase for a metro area in the nation

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2023/05 ... on-growth/