Moving resources
Moving to Kansas City
The metro sits in two states, and most of what people find confusing about moving here traces back to that. This is the guide to picking where you land, before the boxes matter.
Start here
What makes this move different
Most moving advice assumes you already know your new address. If you don’t, the real decisions are which state you want to live in, which of a dozen Johnson County cities fits, and which school district your street is actually in.
We rent reusable moving totes and deliver on the Kansas side, across Johnson County. The Missouri side still gets a fair reading below.
The first decision
Which side of the state line
One metro, two states. Crossing State Line Road changes your income tax, your sales tax, how your house is assessed, and your license plate.
Start with the tax people ask about most, because it’s the one that surprises them. Missouri’s state income tax is 4.7%. Kansas City, Missouri charges its own 1% tax on what you earn, on top of that. Live and work in the city and you’re paying 5.7% of your paycheck in state and local income tax.
Two things make it catch people out. It follows the work, not just the address, so an Overland Park house and a downtown office still means you owe it on that income. And it stops at the Kansas City limits, so Lee’s Summit or Liberty residents working near home never pay it at all.
1%
Kansas City, Missouri's earnings tax, added on top of the state's 4.7%
None
City income tax anywhere in Johnson County, on either count
You can live in Kansas and still owe Kansas City tax.
The Kansas side
Johnson County: the twelve cities below
- Income tax, Advantage
- Two brackets topping a little over 5%, and no city income tax anywhere in Johnson County.
- Sales tax, Drawback
- 6.5% before local taxes, the higher of the two states.
- Property tax, About even
- Homes are assessed at 11.5% of appraised value, then taxed at higher mill levies. Real bills land close to the Missouri side.
- Housing, Drawback
- You pay a premium for Johnson County, and the gap against Kansas City proper is wide.
- Schools, Advantage
- Blue Valley ranks first among metro districts on Niche's 2026 list, with Olathe fourth and Shawnee Mission seventh.
- Safety, Advantage
- Overland Park was named the second safest city in America by WalletHub in October 2025, out of 182 cities.
The Missouri side
Kansas City proper, plus suburbs like Lee's Summit and Liberty
- Income tax, About even
- 4.7% flat, the lower state rate. Add 1% if you live or work inside Kansas City limits, which makes 5.7% there.
- Sales tax, Advantage
- 4.225% before local taxes, the lower of the two states.
- Property tax, About even
- Homes are assessed at 19% of true value, then taxed at lower mill levies. Real bills land close to the Kansas side.
- Housing, Advantage
- Cheaper, and inside Kansas City proper it is dramatically cheaper for the same square footage.
- Schools, Advantage
- Blue Springs and Park Hill rank second and third among metro districts on the same list, with Lee's Summit sixth.
- Safety, Drawback
- Kansas City's violent crime rate runs well above the national average. It varies enormously by neighborhood, and the Missouri suburbs are a different picture entirely.
Read down either column and the pattern is that no side wins outright. Kansas costs more to buy into and gives you the safest cities in the metro. Missouri is cheaper to buy and cheaper to shop in, and carries a city tax the Kansas side doesn’t have. Property tax is close enough to call a wash once you account for the different assessment rules.
So decide on housing, schools and your commute, then check the tax math against your own numbers. Both states have been cutting rates, so confirm the current ones before you lean on any of them, including ours.
Where to live
Johnson County, in three parts
Twelve cities, and they are not interchangeable. Almost everyone is choosing between three areas without knowing they have names.
North Johnson County
The county's oldest corner and the closest to Kansas City. Small lots, big trees, and Old Leawood north of I-435.
- Houses
- Mid-century ranches and bungalows, forties through sixties. Small garages.
- Daily life
- Sidewalks, and retail squares you can walk to in Prairie Village and Fairway.
- Downtown KC
- About 20 minutes, the shortest run in the county.
- Schools
- Almost all Shawnee Mission, whichever city you pick.
Overland Park and Leawood
The two biggest destinations and the widest housing range. Everything turns on how far south of 135th you land.
- Houses
- Postwar streets north of 135th. Newer subdivisions and three-car garages south.
- Daily life
- Downtown Overland Park is walkable. South of 135th is built for driving.
- Downtown KC
- Roughly 25 to 35 minutes, more the further south you start.
- Schools
- Shawnee Mission north, Blue Valley south, Olathe on the west edge.
West Johnson County
Where the county is still building. The most house per dollar here, and you drive for nearly everything.
- Houses
- Newer builds on bigger lots, from Olathe's old core to the southwest edge.
- Daily life
- Car-first, apart from Lenexa City Center's built-from-scratch downtown.
- Downtown KC
- About 20 minutes from Lenexa, 10 to Overland Park.
- Schools
- Olathe, De Soto and Shawnee Mission all cover parts of it.
If you only know one thing about what you want
- The shortest commute and sidewalks
- North Johnson County, especially Prairie Village and Fairway
- The newest house and the most space
- South Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa
- A first house without the county's top prices
- Mission, Merriam, Roeland Park, parts of Shawnee
- A specific school district
- Look up the street address before you pick a city. Read the next section first.
On price, the ordering holds even when the monthly numbers move. Leawood sits at the top, Mission Hills and Fairway are small and expensive, Prairie Village runs high for its house size because inventory is tight and people want the walkability. Overland Park spans the widest band. Olathe, Lenexa and Shawnee give you the most square footage for the money, and Mission, Merriam and Roeland Park are the usual first-house territory.
Housing also costs more on the Kansas side than inside Kansas City, Missouri, by enough that it belongs in the decision. How much depends on the month and which listing service you ask, so work from real comparables and not a headline median.
Each city page covers delivery zones and the questions we hear from people moving there. If your city is already settled, that’s the faster route.
Schools
Your school district is not your city
School district boundaries do not follow city boundaries in Johnson County. An Overland Park address can be in Shawnee Mission, in Blue Valley, or in Olathe. Leawood is split too.
So “we’re moving to Overland Park for the schools” isn’t a plan yet. It names a city that contains three school districts. The answer is always the street address, and Johnson County runs a School Finder tool that takes one and returns your assigned elementary, middle and high school. Check it before you make an offer. Listings get this wrong often enough that agents will tell you to verify it yourself.
If the district you want doesn’t line up with the house you want, Kansas has had open enrollment since a 2022 law, which lets students attend outside their home district where space allows. Space is the catch, and the elementaries people move for are routinely full. Worth asking about, not worth counting on.
Timing
When to move here
The metro has a rhythm, and it shows up in what you pay and who's available.
The last week of the month
Leases turn over and closings land at month end, so that's when the metro moves. Good crews book first, trucks get scarce, and cleaners are stacked. If your date has any give in it, going mid-month is the cheapest scheduling decision available to you.
Summer
Peak season, because families move between school years. Everything costs more and books further out. It's also genuinely hot here by July, which matters more than people expect when they're carrying boxes up a driveway at 2pm. Start early and keep water somewhere you can reach it.
Winter
Quieter, often cheaper, and easier to book on short notice. The tradeoff is ice. One bad morning turns a driveway into a hazard and puts the truck on the street instead of at your door. Build in a fallback day and don't bet the whole plan on a forecast.
The school year
If you have kids, the enrollment calendar usually sets the date before anything else gets a vote. Each Johnson County district runs its own process on its own timing, so ask the new district what they need and when, then work backward from that.
If you cross the line
Changing states is not just changing your address
Moving within Johnson County is an address change. Moving from the Missouri side to the Kansas side starts a new state, and every record starts over with it. People underestimate this every time, usually because the drive was fifteen minutes.
You’ll need a Kansas driver’s license, Kansas registration and title for every vehicle, new voter registration, and an auto policy re-rated for a new state.
Kansas splits the first two across two agencies with two deadlines. The license is the Department of Revenue. The vehicle is your county treasurer. They are separate records, doing one does not do the other, and people find that out at renewal.
10 days
to update a Kansas driver's license, through the Department of Revenue
90 days
to register the vehicle, through your county treasurer, as a separate record
Then there’s the year you moved. You’ll file a part-year return in each state, and if you lived in Kansas City, Missouri for part of it, there’s an earnings tax return to close out too. None of it is hard. It’s just longer than a fifteen-minute drive suggests, and it all lands in the same few weeks.
The utilities change as well. On the Kansas side that’s Evergy, Kansas Gas Service and WaterOne, and WaterOne has one constraint you want to plan for: an adult has to be at the property when the water is turned on, in a weekday window. Trash isn’t automatic in every city either. The moving checklist has the numbers, the lead times and the city-by-city trash situation.
Then the move itself
Once you have an address and a date
The rest of the hub covers execution. Start wherever you are.
Our part is the boxes. We drop clean, numbered totes at your door before you pack and collect them once you’ve unpacked, so there’s no cardboard to buy, build, or break down at the other end. Pricing has the four sizes and the delivery zones, and how it works walks through a rental week.
Questions
Common questions about moving to Kansas City
There's no single right answer, and the tax folklore is less decisive than people repeat. Missouri's state income tax is a little lower than Kansas's, but Kansas City, Missouri adds a 1% earnings tax that Johnson County does not have. Kansas charges more state sales tax. Property taxes are calculated completely differently in the two states and land in a similar place. What genuinely differs is what you get for the money and what your commute looks like, so pick on housing, schools and drive time, then check the tax math against your own numbers.
It comes down to how old you want the house and how much you want to drive. North Johnson County, meaning Prairie Village, Fairway, Mission, Merriam, Roeland Park and their neighbors, has mid-century homes on small lots, sidewalks, and the shortest commute downtown at about 20 minutes. Overland Park and Leawood cover the widest range, with older established streets north of roughly 135th Street and newer subdivisions south of it. Olathe, Lenexa and Shawnee give you the most house for the money and the newest construction, and you drive for nearly everything. Mission, Merriam and Roeland Park are where first-time buyers tend to land.
It's a 1% tax on earned income, which means salaries, wages, commissions and tips. Kansas City, Missouri has collected it since 1963 and it funds close to half the city's general fund. Residents of Kansas City, Missouri pay it on everything they earn, including income earned outside the city. Nonresidents pay it on the portion they earn inside city limits. Voters renewed it in April 2026.
If you work inside Kansas City, Missouri city limits, yes, on the income you earn there. Living in Overland Park makes you a nonresident, and nonresidents owe the earnings tax on work performed in the city. This is the part people get wrong when they move across the state line and keep a downtown job. If you both live and work on the Kansas side, it doesn't apply to you at all.
It depends entirely on the address, because district boundaries do not follow city boundaries in Johnson County. An Overland Park address can be in Shawnee Mission, in Blue Valley, or in Olathe. Leawood is split too. The only reliable way to find out is to look up the specific street address in Johnson County's School Finder tool, which the districts themselves point parents at. Never assume the district from the city name on a listing, and never assume the listing got it right.
Plan on 25 to 35 minutes by car in normal traffic from most of Johnson County, less from the northern cities, where the average one-way commute runs closer to 20 minutes. The reliable pinch point is I-35 northbound between K-10 and the city during morning rush. RideKC does run buses into downtown, including an express from Oak Park Mall, but a one-way trip is around an hour, so most people here drive and the transit option is a backup.
The published rates aren't comparable, which is why you see confident answers in both directions. Kansas assesses a home at 11.5% of its appraised value and Missouri assesses at 19% of true value, so a Kansas mill levy looks higher against a much smaller assessed base. Once you work it through, effective rates on the two sides land close to each other. To compare two specific houses, pull the actual annual tax bill for each. That's public record in both states and it takes about five minutes.
Crossing the state line means starting a new state's records from scratch. You'll need a Kansas driver's license, Kansas vehicle registration and titling through your county treasurer, new voter registration, and an auto insurance policy re-rated for the new state. Kansas gives you 10 days for the license with the Department of Revenue and 90 days for the vehicle, and those are two separate records in two separate places. You'll also file a part-year return in each state for the year you moved.
Mid-month, and outside of summer if your calendar allows it. The last week of any month is when leases turn over and closings land, so crews, trucks and cleaners all get scarce at once. Summer is peak season because families move between school years, and it's hot enough by July to slow a move down. Winter is cheaper and easier to book, with ice as the real risk, so keep a fallback day. If school enrollment drives your date, ask the new district what they need first and plan backward.
We deliver across Johnson County on the Kansas side of the metro, which is where our totes are stocked and routed from. If you're moving from Johnson County to somewhere just over the state line, send us both ZIP codes with your booking and we'll tell you what we can do. Don't assume the answer is no.
We deliver across Johnson County, including Overland Park, Leawood, Prairie Village and Olathe. See every city we serve.
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