Cities and states offer welcome mats — and pots of cash — to lure remote workers

Theresa Kaiser was working as an assistant dean for the University of Michigan Law School when she pulled up stakes and moved to Tulsa, Okla., lured by a $10,000 relocation grant from the city.

“I love working remotely,” Kaiser, 61, told Yahoo Finance. “I’m not trying to climb the ladder anymore. I’m not trying to make a name for myself. So a lot of that pressure’s gone for me.”

Tulsa is among a handful of cities and states targeting remote workers to relocate from more expensive areas, even as many companies tighten remote working arrangements. For those workers who can land and hold onto a fully remote gig, the perks can be considerable.

With its Ascend WV program, West Virginia offers $12,000 to remote workers who move to the state. The money is paid out over a two-year period. Applicants must work full-time remote jobs or own businesses outside of West Virginia that can be managed remotely.

Other cities and regions with incentive programs for remote workers looking to relocate include: Texarkana, Texas and Arkansas, Columbus, Ga., Noblesville, Ind., and eastern Kentucky.

“We’re incredibly excited about the momentum and the quality of individuals and families who have chosen to relocate to Texarkana through this initiative,” Rob Sitterley, president and CEO of the REDI…Set…Move program in Texarkana. “At this point, we have received well over 8,100 applicants, and interest continues to grow.”

Tulsa rolled out its Tulsa Remote initiative in 2018 to lure new residents by offering them $10,000 grants for a year to work from there remotely. To date, 3,600 workers have taken them up on that offer.

Some caveats: You have to have a full-time remote job to be eligible for the program. You also have to have lived outside of the state of Oklahoma for at least a year and be eligible to work in the United States.

Tulsa Remote provides co-working space for the year, and offers monthly meetups and workshops to develop skills and strategies for working remotely effectively.

Backed by the Tulsa-based nonprofit George Kaiser Family Foundation, the goal is to bring in people who’ll stick around, get involved in the community, and strengthen the local economy.

“It was really an experiment to diversify the talent workforce here in Tulsa,” Justin Harlan, managing director of the program, told Yahoo Finance.

“Tulsa is a city that’s often reliant on oil and gas as an industry, which can be a royal rollercoaster even in the best of times,” he said. “And so our hope was that if we could bring knowledge workers to the city, that we would build up an economy that was more resilient for the future.”