Loads of Americans are moving out of these 18 states

Rick Wilking/Reuters

People move for many different reasons. For instance, some get new jobs, others retire, and some just want to be closer to their families.

While many people in the US move within the same state — the Census Bureau estimated in 2011 that 40% of moves are within 50 miles — there are patterns for those who did make interstate moves, according to Atlas Van Lines, a national moving company.

Atlas looked at 77,705 interstate moves and found that 18 states had more people moving out than in, whereas 12 had the reverse happen. We rounded up the 18 that had outflows for 2015. Most are in the upper-Midwest, which Atlas said has been on an outbound trend for a while.

"The Midwestern states experienced a major shift to outbound moves, with Wisconsin, Iowa and South Dakota going from balanced to outbound in 2015," said the report. "Similar to 2013 and 2014, North Dakota was the only state in the region to register as inbound."

See the states that topped the list, in order from lowest to higher percentage outbound migration:

18. Louisiana

Bridget Coila/Flickr

Total people moving in: 891

Total people moving out: 1121

Net Flow: -230

Percent of Moves Outbound: 55.7%

17. West Virginia

Wikimedia Commons

Total people moving in: 222

Total people moving out: 280

Net Flow: -58

Percent of Moves Outbound: 55.8%

16. Nebraska

Flickr/Nicolas Henderson

Total people moving in: 418

Total people moving out: 528

Net Flow: -110

Percent of Moves Outbound: 55.8%

See the rest of the story at Business Insider