9 Things That Surprise Newcomers Who Move to Michigan

Moving to Michigan costs newcomers more than a moving truck and a security deposit.

Michigan drivers carry some of the priciest car insurance bills in the country, no matter how clean their driving record looks.

That’s the bad news.

But it’s not all doom and gloom.

These are the things that surprise newcomers to Michigan most, both the costly and the delightful.

1. Yooper or Troll?

You’ll land in one of two Michigan nicknames before anyone even asks where you moved from.

Settle in the Upper Peninsula and you’re a Yooper.

It’s short for U.P.-er, a nickname well-established enough to make Merriam-Webster’s dictionary in 2014.

Settle in the Lower Peninsula and you might occasionally hear yourself called a Troll instead, the joke being that you’d technically live under the Mackinac Bridge that connects Michigan’s two halves.

Don’t expect to hear it often, though.

Even Yoopers admit Troll isn’t a nickname they reach for regularly, and you’re more likely to hear them call your half of the state “Downstate” instead.

2. Michigan Left

You want to turn left at a busy Michigan intersection, and the road just won’t let you.

Instead, you drive straight through the intersection, then loop back through a U-turn at a median crossover a few hundred feet down the road.

State transportation officials call it a Michigan left.

You’ll find it built into Michigan roads since the late 1960s.

It works.

The setup cuts crashes at busy intersections by 30% to 60%, and moves more cars through in less time than a normal left-turn signal.

You’ll just have to unlearn a lifetime of turning left the ordinary way first.

3. Central Time, Sort Of

Drive far enough west through the Upper Peninsula, and your phone changes the time on you.

Four Upper Peninsula counties, Iron, Dickinson, Gogebic, and Menominee, all border Wisconsin, so they’ve kept Central time since 1973, while the rest of Michigan runs on Eastern.

Cross into that corner of the state, and your clock jumps back an hour with no sign warning you first.

That’s confusing.

You’ll just set your phone to match your Wisconsin neighbors and let the rest of Michigan catch up.

4. Cash for Your Empties

Ever get paid for bringing your own trash back to a store?

In Michigan, you do, and it’s been that way since before most current residents were born.

Every eligible can and bottle carries a 10-cent deposit at checkout, the highest deposit in the country.

Return your empties.

The dime comes back to you.

Michigan voters approved the law back in 1976.

You’ll find a return machine humming by the front doors of grocery stores across the state.

You’ll quickly learn to save your empties instead of tossing them in the regular recycling bin.

5. Insurance Bill

Car insurance is often one of the priciest changes Michigan newbies face.

Michigan’s no-fault insurance system requires you to carry personal injury protection most other states don’t.

That pushes your premiums up fast.

You’ll pay an average of $2,794 a year for coverage, well above what most of the country pays.

Ouch.

That’s a bigger number than most newcomers budget for.

A 2020 change to the state’s insurance law eased those costs somewhat, but you’ll still likely pay more than drivers in nearly every other state.

6. Deer Own Dusk

You’ll share Michigan’s roads with more deer than drivers in almost any other state have to.

State troopers log car-deer crashes across Michigan every year, most of them at dawn or dusk when the animals move most.

Your odds of hitting a deer sit at about 1 in 61 on any given drive.

Those are rough odds.

Only a couple of states rank worse for deer crashes than Michigan.

You’ll learn fast to slow down near tree lines and wooded medians once you start driving Michigan’s rural roads after sunset.

7. Hand Pie of the UP

Move to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (UP), and you’ll run into the savory pasty before you run into much else.

Cornish miners brought the recipe over in the 1840s, a meat and vegetable pie baked inside a thick crust they could carry into the copper and iron mines.

Miners gripped the crimped edge with dirty hands and tossed it once the filling ran out.

You get to keep the crust now.

You’ll find every UP diner, gas station, and grocery store selling its own version.

Bring up gravy versus ketchup, and the argument turns heated fast.

8. Vernors Bites Back

Michigan’s homegrown soda will catch you off guard the first time you take a sip.

A Detroit pharmacist named James Vernor created the ginger ale in 1866, and it’s still the oldest ginger ale brand still sold in America today.

The first sip surprises you.

It’s spicier than you’d expect, carrying far more ginger bite than Canada Dry or other national brands, sharp enough to clear a stuffy nose.

You’ll find many Michiganders pouring it over ice cream, mixing it into cocktails, and reaching for it first whenever a stomach feels off.

9. More Coast Than Any State but One

Michigan doesn't touch an ocean.

That's the last thing on your mind once you see the coastline anyway.

The Great Lakes wrap around Michigan's two peninsulas for 3,224 miles of shoreline, more than every other state except Alaska.

Locals call it the state's third coast.

If you grew up near saltwater, you'll expect a briny smell and a tide chart.

You'll get neither, just fresh water clear enough to see twenty feet down on a calm day off the Lower Peninsula's western shore.

No salt in sight.