New Yorker seeking homeschooling help & other questions (Jackson, Columbus: 2015, rental homes)

[jolenegreen]

Looking to move to Mississippi! Need a change of life! We homeschooling and just can't seem to figure out the homeschooling rules...wondered if maby someone could explain them a bit more clear to me! Are there alot of homeschooling families down tbhere!?

Also looking for general questions which I can't seem to find either. Looking for a family friendly place to move..we have 8 children. Not looking to buy right away but rent. Can't afford much over $700 a month rent..not including utilities....can pay those separate. Also wondering about car insurance and inspections down there. We own 2015 Chevy traverse. Full coverage is about $125 a month. Have to have a yearly inspection as well. Thanks everyone!

[Southern man]

With 8 kids, I would recommend you send them to the public schools you will be paying taxes to support.

[GrandviewGloria]

Car tags vary, depending on where you're living. Heavily "enriched" (by diversity) places tend to have high car tags, while the whiteopias have low taxes on cars. You'll have to call each prospective locality's tax collector, and give them the VIN number of your vehicle, to know what your tag will cost.

The downside of living in one of the rare whiteopias, is that rents are going to start at well over double your comfort range (desperate people will pay -almost - ANYTHING, to get their kids out of public schools in the "enriched" zones, and are paying ridiculous rents for the most wretched houses and trailers, in the whiteopias. This is compounded by measures, in the better communities, to stop slumlords from "taking houses rental". Various city ordinances, and a rash of mysterious slumlord deaths, severely limits supply. But anyway, two thou per month, for a ramshackle Sixties 3bedroom ranch-style with a broken central unit, fleas in the carpet, and black mould, is not what you're looking for.). There comes the point where rental prices intersect with the costs of private schooling (this limits rental prices, somewhat). Non-prosperous persons with more than one child generally can afford NEITHER high rent, NOR private schools, and end up leaving the state, for less enriched regions in America. So, you're lucky that you are homeschooling. That will allow you to live in a cheap, enriched area, without having to shell out fifty thou - tuition for eight - at a Christian academy.

You'll be needing either a derelict house, way out in the boonies, a very used doublewide, out in the boonies, or a house in a crime-ridden and nearly abandoned district of an "enriched" city - to stay in your price range. Mississippi has LOTS of boonies (as well as lots of "enriched" districts of cities). However, be aware that landowners generally remove every possible dwelling, as soon as they can. Crime is rampant in the countryside, and so you want as few welfare layabouts and meth labs in your locality as is possible (beyond the danger of home invasions, and encountering them driving drunk on local roads, there's the habit of meth dealers' stealing ammonia from farm fertilizer tanks). Larger landowners, for that reason, snap up small parcels, as soon as they hit the market, and tear down the dwellings.

However, there are exceptions. It'll just take some looking... LOTS of looking. I know people who, for years, looked for cheap rural dwellings (to buy), who NEVER found anything.

It will help us, in guiding you, to tell us whether you are Jewish Fundamentalists, Protestant Fundamentalists, Hippie Types, Survivalists, Evangelical Catholics, or one of those gorgeous Polish couples who just can't help having lots and lots and lots of children (Heaven knows... If my husband and I had been body doubles for Martha Stewart - aka Martha Kostyra, and Ken Ryker - aka Gary Pokorney - then we might have been so unable to keep our hands off each other, we might have forgotten to use birth control for an entire decade). We could then guide you to places where you'll find a supportive cohort. OH... and racial specifics are crucial, too (what's safe for one ethnic group can be unsafe for another). And are you Old Stock New Yorkers, or immigrants?

And what do you do for a living? How would you prefer, in your new life, to make ends meet? (and how do you transport ten people, in a vehicle built for a maximum of eight?)

I must say, though, that Mississippi is a TERRIBLE place for a poor family to choose. It's routinely listed as being one of the unhealthiest places, one of the worst places to be a child (http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/2015/0...ates-Have-Baby), one of the worst places to be a woman, and one of the worst places to be poor -or black (http://www.theroot.com/articles/cult...ck_people.html) - or, just plain Worst Place to Live (http://blog.gulflive.com/mississippi...pi_is_the.html). "Services" are basically nonexistent, and state assistance to the poor is quite minimal.In general, people and organizations are busy aiding poor people in ESCAPING Mississippi, rather than helping them move there. However, if you and yours are already adept at growing your own food, and are very independent types who generate your own opportunities and amusements, then maybe such a move could work.

People who DO thrive in Mississippi are the types who have their weddings in Mississippi Magazine's Wedding Register (https://www.mismag.com/wedding-gallery-attire/). It helps to be blond, Baptist, smart, capable of being in perpetual productive motion during your waking hours, someone with a high-Dollar degree, and, most important, born enmeshed within a web of friends and family who will surround you, from cradle to grave.

However, because of the high levels of resourcefulness and productivity required to thrive in Mississippi, VOLAGS seeking to resettle immigrant families to Mississippi are really being cruel and callous toward their charges. It's really a form of victimization, to dump them in a state where they have no chance of thriving.

Car inspections, supposedly, have been done away with, in Mississippi (for better or worse).

You might want to check out houses in Southwest Jackson. A family of ten, who stay on the property, could conceivably maintain a secure compound, there (secure against incursions by local 'under-served youths'). You could get a two acre parcel (yards are big, in the older, virtually abandoned, districts of Jackson), and raise lots of vegetables. Jackson has pretty much every possible religion, so you could hook up with a local congregation, and network within its community.

[An Einnseanair]

Contrary to the national perception, Mississippi is not a homogeneous state. There are huge differences in demographics, politics, and geography between the different areas. The Delta, the Coast, the Pine Belt, the Red Hills, the Black Prairie, etc. are all different. Also huge differences in prices related to rental homes and car tags.

Do you have any idea to which part of the state you may move?

Mississippi has a personal property tax that is set by the local jurisdiction that is included with car tag renewal. It varies wildly. The tag fee in a rural part of a county may be $100 while the tag for the exact same vehicle in the same county but registered within town limits could be $500. The more valuable the vehicle the higher the tag fee.

Incidentally, how do you fit 8 kids in a Chevy Traverse? Do you strap the younger ones to the roof?

There is a large network of homeschoolers in the state. I have relatives who home school, but I don't know the details of the homeschooling laws.

[th3_mountaineer]

There is a good network of homeschoolers in the Starkville & Columbus area. If you end up moving that way please let me know.