Gen X grew up on latchkeys and MTV, while millennials have been accused of killing everything from department stores to breakfast cereal. Now both generations are helping keep moving trucks and mortgage lenders busy in Sarasota-Manatee.

The North Port–Sarasota–Bradenton metro ranked No. 5 nationally for net gains among millennial U-Haul customers and No. 3 among Generation X, according to the company’s latest mid-year migration report.

The findings are based on one-way truck, trailer and U-Box transactions from July 2025 through June 2026. U-Haul defines millennials as those born from 1981 through 1996 and Gen X as those born from 1965 through 1980.

Dallas–Fort Worth and Houston led the country for millennial gains, followed by Orlando and the San Francisco Bay area. North Port–Sarasota–Bradenton came next, ahead of Lakeland–Winter Haven, Boise, Idaho and other metros in the top 10.

Among Gen X customers, only Fort Myers and Charleston recorded larger net gains. The Sarasota metro area finished ahead of Miami, Nashville, Salt Lake City and Tampa.

U-Haul’s data doesn’t represent everyone who moved. The rankings measure the net gain or loss of one-way U-Haul equipment, and each customer’s generation is based on the person who rented it. Still, the results add fresh evidence to a demographic shift already visible in other data. The idea that younger adults are becoming a larger part of Sarasota-Manatee no longer rests on a single study.

A RentCafe analysis published earlier this year found that the number of millennial homeowner households in the metro nearly tripled from 2018 to 2023, climbing from 13,212 to 35,144. The 166 percent increase was the largest among 107 metropolitan areas, with at least 50,000 millennial households.

Millennial renter households also grew, rising 15.4 percent to 29,196. By 2023, homeowners accounted for about 55 percent of the millennial households included in the study—a notable result for a generation so closely associated with delayed homeownership that “millennial homeowner” once sounded nearly as unlikely as “affordable waterfront bungalow.”

RentCafe’s figures showed rapid household growth, but they couldn’t determine how much resulted from people moving into the region. Household counts can also rise when existing residents establish new households or renters become homeowners. U-Haul’s separate transaction data now provides more direct evidence that millennials are arriving from elsewhere.

A second U-Haul report offers a partial glimpse of where some customers are coming from. It examines the leading destinations for people leaving U.S. metros with at least 1 million residents.

Among millennials departing the Tampa area, North Port–Sarasota–Bradenton was the No. 1 net-gain destination. The Sarasota metro also ranked among the five leading destinations for Gen X customers leaving Baltimore, Buffalo, Columbus and St. Louis. Among baby boomers, it made the top five for customers leaving Cincinnati, Detroit and St. Louis.

That doesn’t mean those cities supply most of Sarasota-Manatee’s newcomers, but the findings suggest that its pull stretches from nearby Tampa to the Midwest and Northeast—and reaches well beyond retirees.

The region’s place in U-Haul’s growth rankings isn’t new. Based on 2021 moves, North Port ranked No. 4 among the company’s top 25 growth cities, while Sarasota–Bradenton landed at No. 10. North Port rose to No. 2 in U-Haul’s 2025 city rankings.

Florida ranked No. 2 nationally in U-Haul’s broader 2025 Growth Index, which wasn’t divided by generation and drew on more than 2.5 million one-way transactions. The state had remained among the top four for eleven consecutive years.

Out-of-state driver’s license exchanges provide another measure of the trend. Florida Realtors data examined earlier this year showed that thousands of people traded licenses from other states for Florida licenses in Sarasota and Manatee counties during 2025. New York remained the leading source for both counties, followed by states including New Jersey, Illinois and Pennsylvania.

The datasets measure different things. Driver’s license exchanges indicate that people are establishing Florida residency, though they don’t distinguish between buyers and renters. U-Haul transactions capture the direction of do-it-yourself moves but don’t prove permanent residency. RentCafe counts households rather than individual arrivals.

The region hasn’t stopped attracting retirees. Florida ranked No. 3 nationally for net gains among baby boomers and was the only state to place in the top 10 for all four generations tracked by U-Haul.

Sarasota-Manatee’s retirement identity hasn't completely changed. It’s simply no longer the whole story—and more of the moving trucks pulling in belong to people who know their way around an order of avocado toast.