living in a "bad neighborhood" to afford SAHMing?

I am recently a SHAM after working part time outside the home for the past 5 years (before we had children, I always worked full time). If it meant we had to live in an unsafe neighborhood i'd be back to work...full time if necessary, in a heartbeat to provide a save home for my children. We are in an upper middle class suburban neighborhood with no public housing and no apartment complexes. We chose this area with a purpose...a safe, family oriented neighborgood for our children to grow up in. i realize that bad things can happen no matter what type of neighborhood you live in, but the picture you paint (stray bullets : ) Is not something i personally would ever consider. I hope you find a safer place for your family...that place sounds scary. I understand your attachment to your house, but on the bright side, home is where the heart is, and you will come to love your new home as well

Thanks for your replies .

At times we've lived in borderline neighborhoods but never in the thick of it all. We now live in a economically diverse suburb. I think if there was a high chance that a stray bullet might come into our house or backyard I would consider finding a way to earn a bit more to move to a safer neighborhood. (maybe clean houses for a morning or two a week or offices at night)

I don't, however, think that area income levels alone are enough to justify a move to a particular area. There are problems at every level and it's unwise to assume that living in middle class (or higher) neighborhood alone will keep kids safe. I go to a SAHM group weekly- one woman lives in the richest suburb and another in one of the worst areas in the city. We were talking one day when the city mom commented that it was the kids from the upscale side that were coming in regularly to buy from the kids in the city. Point is, parents need to be aware no matter where they're living.

I think it's hard to ignore larger social problems if you do live in a rough area. It can provide moments for teaching compassion but can also help provide awareness at an early age that could keep them from getting scammed later on in life. You can use these moments to teach social action, justice, and charity. You also can use these experiences to teach your children about how to make better choices to have a healthy and rewarding life.

I hope it works out for you. Trust your instincts and listen to your kids' feelings. That should be enough to guide you.

I grew up in a not-so-nice and not-so-safe neighborhood. There were plenty of project housing and other low income housing. The schools were garbage, there was no place to play because the playground were awful and dangerous and usually littered with crack vials and not a day went by when you didn't hear sirens, fighting or something else that made you scared. As such, if I had to choose betweeen a safe neighborhood for my family where my children could go out and play and get sunshine, have access to decent libraries and pools and playgrounds, etc and working full-time, I'd have to opt for working full time. I couldn't get out of the neighborhood I grew up in fast enough and I have no intention of ever ever going back. Children, in my opinion, all children deserve to feel safe and free. If I can give that to my child, I would be very happy. I want to be a SAHM very badly. I figure if I work hard now while ds is relatively young, I would have put myself in a financial position to start my own business to make enough money to live in a better neighborhood.

Thankfully this isn't the worst part of town, definitely not the best either. Our neighborhood is fairly diverse middle to low income. heck our rent is only $350 a month. I've never feared for my saftely, we live near a college but it's a babtist college

We do. We rent a duplex...the building itself is fine, it's actually really new (2001), but it's in a weird part of town. There is a HUGE abandoned apartment building around the corner, and a large percentage of our area seem to be transient. There is a lot of new construction multi-family dwellings, surrounded by a lot of older, run down homes. You find a lot of petty theft, car break-ins, but no really major crime. Most of our neghbors have had their cars broken into---the neighbors who shared a wall with us, had their truck broken into, a few days after we moved in! We've been lucky! It REALLY bothered me at first, but I got over it Now I just find my neighbors interesting And I made sure that I got renter's insurance

Nowhere is completely safe....well maybe except for where we live No honestly, we live in a VERY quiet country town, there is no "bad neighborhood" here, however there is a disturbingly high number of registered sex offenders here and in the next town over. We lived in an upper-middle class neighborhood before and I was approached on a few occasions by policemen asking me if I knew anything about the latest break-in. The neighborhood dh and I lived in before we were married and had children was getting bad- and that was in 2003-2004, and its horrible now. Shootings, homicides, you name it and its happened over there. We're glad to be out, even though we do miss the $375 rent. However I still feel strongly enough about being a SAHM that even if it meant living in a bad neighborhood I would still stay home.

we live in the heart of the ghetto. two houses down there was a drive-by. a teenage kid got shot. he lived. about 1/3 of the houses are boarded up and the kids are all raggedy and unsupervised.
but our house cost less than a used car. and we like it here. and we're staying.
2 years ago we bought this big, drafty house so we could fill it with friends and have acrowded, happy house. so far it's worked out. we didn't mean to have kids, and we'll move before it's time for ds to start school, but for now it's ok. we've never had trouble with anyone. i think mostly you only get trouble if you go looking for it. we take care of our property, have an alarm system, and mostly keep to ourselves. we're friends with nearby families & aren't enemies with nearby gangsters, bikers & dealers, so we are left alone.
i WANT to live in a poor area, not only because i'm poor, but because it's living what i believe. social justice issues are right in my face and it's a lot easier to do something about them from here. plus i'm not some hypocrite spouting my opinions from the nice, safe suburbs.
and the bus service is good.

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I apologize if i am misinterpreting the wording of your post, but are you saying that those of us who live in 'the nice, safe suburbs" shouldn't have opinons about save vs unsafe neighborhoods?

I have never lived in the "ghetto" but I grew up in an area immedieately bordered (as in 2 streets over) by some very rough neighborhoods...all public housing, biker gangs, drug dealers, pimps. There is no way on God's green earth that I'd put my children in an area where guns were being fired and children were being shot. In my old neighborhood, no one got much trouble unless, as you mentioned, they were involved with shady people. but what if your child was hit in the crossfire? I realize that bad things happen everywhere, and shootings can happen in the most affluent neighborhoods, and just because you don't see the dealer on the corner, doesn't mean the lawyer in the house next store doesn't have a few grams of coccaine in his house. I am not naive. I don't think it's fair for you to say that anyone who doesn't live in a poor neighborhood shouldn't have an opinion.

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i'm sorry, i worded that completley wrong. what i meant is that i would feel like a hypocrite if i lived in a suburb but had the opinions i do about poverty, politics, etc. i think everyone should make the choice about where they live, based on their values and comfort levels.
so i guess you could say that i choose to live where i do because most of the people here aren't given a choice.
also housing is very, very cheap and dh is a full time student, so living here prevents debt.
again, i'm sorry for not choosing better words.

We live in a less desirable area, right now we're not even owning our own home, we're living in with my in-laws, I can't work here yet because I moved here from Europe, to America, and I am awaiting my working visa.
So I am a stay at home because I want to be, but also, I really don't have a choice to work right now.
Before my son, I lived here too, and never thought of it as a "bad" neighborhood, we have had someone being shot after a arguement, and some idiot who shot at someone in a car because they were fighting and the bullets went through the door of my BIL's shop. Thankfullu no one got hurt.

Do I like that I live here? Heck no, I can't wait to move, but right now, its either this, or move somewhere where this happeneds every night.
We live on a decent street, where we hardly have any problems, its just the surrounding area's that are not so great.

I feel like a bad mother, trust me, and my husband works his butt off for us, and is working up to something, so we can move away in about a year.

I hope no one thinks here, that I am happy I put my son in a area that isn't great, there are many nights I cry myself to sleep because I want everything perfect for my son.
But I can't continue beating myself up either.

I just need to accept that this is all we can afford right now, and that soon we'll have a chance on something better.