KB Home Joins Growing California Exodus, Relocates Headquarters from Los Angeles to Tempe, Arizona

KB Home, one of the nation’s largest homebuilders and a Fortune 1000 company ranked No. 526, announced this week it is moving its corporate headquarters from Los Angeles to Tempe, Arizona, beginning in spring 2027. The relocation marks the latest high-profile departure of a California-based business seeking lower costs, fewer regulatory hurdles, and high-growth markets.

KB Home—a giant homebuilder ranked No. 526 on the Fortune 1000—to move its headquarters from L.A. to Arizona

Back in 2012, @kbhome did almost 4 times as much homebuilding in Los Angeles County as in Maricopa County

Now, it does nearly 8 times more business in Maricopa County pic.twitter.com/xrGA4xZNcb

— Lance Lambert (@NewsLambert) April 10, 2026

In an official statement, KB Home said the move will consolidate executive leadership and key corporate functions at a new headquarters in Tempe’s Hayden Ferry Lakeside campus along Tempe Town Lake. The company cited a desire for a more centralized, lower-cost operating environment with a business-friendly climate that will “bring our teams together in a more collaborative environment.” CEO Robert McGibney stated, “Phoenix is the right place to do it. It positions KB Home to operate more effectively and supports the next phase of our growth.” The new location also offers convenient access to Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport and builds on existing corporate functions already based in the Phoenix area, according to the announcement.

While KB Home will maintain a significant operational footprint in California — including six divisions and more than 100 active communities, particularly in San Bernardino County — the headquarters shift underscores a dramatic reversal in the company’s business focus. As housing analyst Lance Lambert noted, back in 2012 KB Home built nearly four times as many homes in Los Angeles County as in Maricopa County, Arizona. Today, it closes nearly eight times more homes in the Phoenix metro area than in L.A. County.

“On one hand, the cost-saving move reflects how homebuilders are tightening operations after several years of margin compression during this softer post-boom period. On the other hand, it underscores how the geographic center of U.S. homebuilding has shifted over the past decade—and where it may continue to shift in the years ahead,” Lambert observes.

The decision comes amid “broader margin compression”  in the homebuilding sector following the post-pandemic boom. Industry observers point to Arizona’s stronger population growth, abundant land availability, and far less restrictive permitting and development regulations compared to coastal California markets as key drivers. California’s high land costs, lengthy approval timelines, heavy regulatory burdens, and elevated operating expenses have increasingly pushed builders — and businesses across sectors — toward states like Arizona, Texas, Florida, Nevada, and the Carolinas.

This relocation is not occurring in isolation. It fits a well-documented pattern of California businesses fleeing the state’s anti-business climate of high taxes, excessive regulation, skyrocketing energy and insurance costs, persistent crime in urban centers, and the high cost of capital improvements.

California Globe has chronicled this exodus extensively.

Just last month, Yamaha Motor Corporation, U.S.A. announced it would relocate its operations from Cypress, California, to Kennesaw, Georgia — ending more than 50 years in the state — citing a business-friendly environment free of California’s crime and regulatory burdens. 

In February, Public Storage relocated its headquarters from Glendale to Frisco, Texas, after more than 50 years in California.

After 77 years as a California icon, In-N-Out Burger announced the closure of  its California headquarters, moving significant operations to Tennessee.

Blue Diamond Growers announced the closure of its 110-year-old Sacramento almond processing plant (resulting in approximately 600 job losses), with operations shifting to other in-state facilities in Turlock and Salida due to the plant having “fallen behind the times” and the high costs of necessary capital improvements. 

Leprino Foods, the world’s largest mozzarella cheese maker, is closing its Lemore, California, dairy processing plant — which has operated since 1910 and employs more than 300 workers — and relocating production to a new $1 billion facility in Lubbock, Texas, citing high operating costs in California. 

Anheuser-Busch is closing its Budweiser brewery in Fairfield, California (along with facilities in New Jersey and New Hampshire), impacting a total of 238 employees across the sites, again driven by high costs of doing business and expensive capital upgrades. 

X/Twitter, Space X, Oracle, Hewlett Packard, Charles Schwab, Toyota Motor North America, Chevron, and Jelly Belly add to the mega-businesses that fled California due to punitive taxes and regulations imposed by Sacramento Democrats.

According to Hoover Institution research, 352 California companies moved their headquarters to other states between 2018 and 2021 alone — including 78 in 2019, 75 in 2020, and 153 in 2021.

Broader analyses from the Public Policy Institute of California show a net loss of 789 company headquarters from 2011 to 2021, resulting in the loss of about 77,600 headquarters jobs. These headquarters moves, along with full operations shifts and plant closures, have contributed to the departure of tens of thousands of additional high-paying jobs and significant economic activity from the state.

As the Hoover Institution has repeatedly warned, businesses are leaving California because it is “no longer economically feasible for them to stay.” High taxes, punitive regulations, a hostile political environment, and the cumulative burden of compliance have eroded the state’s once-dominant economic edge.

Is it any wonder that California ranks dead last in Chief Executive Magazine’s Best & Worst States for Business for the 14th consecutive year?

KB Home’s move to Tempe — while retaining California divisions — sends another warning signal: even companies deeply rooted in the state’s housing market are voting with their feet.

For California lawmakers, the question remains whether they will look inward and address the root causes driving this exodus or continue watching iconic and major businesses pack up and head for greener, more business-friendly pastures in red states.