How do you figure out where to move (when moving states)?

We did a spreadsheet where we listed the factors that were important to one or both of us and gave them a weight. Being able to find work and the price of housing were more important than, say, being a day's drive from the ocean or whether there are professional sports teams.

Each of you make a list of what traits and features are important about any place you might relocate to, without discussing what you put on it. Then compare lists and discuss how important each one is. Start a spreadsheet, your traits the rows. Now start working on potential cities/towns, one per column.

There are books and websites that gather statistics and rate places for quality of life. I don't always agree with their methods or what they weight, but it's a starting point.

The statistical spreadsheet might be useful, but there are aspects of locations that the U.S. Census Bureau doesn't capture and some of those aspects are far more important to me than the bureaucratic method.

What matters to me is how nice the people are who live there:  pleasant, welcoming, emotional maturity, friendliness, etc.   How do I assess that?  Visit the city and interact with as many of those people as practical and get a feel for the vibe of the place.

Both methods have sampling errors and both might not be a fair assessment on any given day for dozens of reasons.  But you gotta start somewhere.

Another technique might be to live somewhere for, say, a month.  And then move on to the next place.  After a few years of that, you are likely to make a very good decision.

Make a list of thigs that are important to the two of you.includig job availability and put together a checklist to compare cities with.

You have to decide which things are most important to you. Schools may be top of the list for parents or people who want to be parents eventually. Job prospects in an area are big for a lot of people. If you want to buy a house, then clearly it wouldn't be a good idea to move to Manhattan if your budget for a house is more suited to Kentucky. No one else can decide what's most important for you.

Don’t worry about their being too many options. You will get some of them out the way fast. 

You both, separately, need to think about what really matters. Does it have to be a big city. Or near an airport. Do you want a home soon, what price can you afford. 

List out some places that you both like and start a chart 

Narrow it down and start applying for jobs. 

My daughter and her husband finished grad school want the heck out of California. Home prices are outrageous. They really are willing to go almost anywhere. So they are checking out job options and check out the company and then the area.