Fleeing Hitler-France 1940
By-Hanna Diamond--Oxford University Press..

i read the run-down on this today in the New York Review
of Books..just what happens when a million people hit the
roads in an attempt to flee to safety..and just not the
French but those in Belgium were also on the roads...
and after the war the displaced and the Germans who were
expeled from Poland,Hungary,Czechoslovakia all on the move.
in England,Churchill made plans to pervent mass exodus in
that country in case the Germans invaded..
pick it up at a library and save the $30 for MRE's...

Will put it on the list to order at the library, thanks.

I also recommend this book:

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, by Max Brooks

It's fiction (no, really!) but in my opinion the way it is written accurately predicts the behaviour of all kinds of groups of people around the world when faced with a large disaster. In this case it is zombies, but I think Max Brooks' observations would apply to real events. It's entertaining too.

My favourite chapter is the one where everyone escapes to the country in their RVs. It's like a giant, friendly picnic at first, but then winter approaches, and soon all the trees have been chopped down. Food becomes scarce...

(This is in no way meant to belittle the actual events of WWII, but for a work of fiction it painted some very realistic and believable scenarios).

A

What do you guys suggest I do then, bugging out is a priority for me due to my neighborhood. even durig normal times out hood has gotten to where we don't feel safe any more. Our house has been up for sale for six months now.
Yesterday my wife was on the phone with me when she saw someone looking in the window at her, last week the homicide dectives came buy gathering information about a murder down the street from us. Our vehicles have been broken into and vandalized, shed broken into, etc.
Were trying to get out of there but any decent neighborhood the housing costs 2-3 times as much and I don't think I can stretch the budget that much.

The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks is also a very entertaining book. While it's fiction it's very well written...if one didn't know (or believe) zombies weren't real you'd swear it was fact. It also has some really relevant observations which could apply to a real survival situation.

We were in your position 9 years ago. Friday and Saturday nights, you could listen for the gunshots and then the sirens shortly thereafter.

Do whatever you have to do to get out. Redefine your concept of "decent neighborhood." Look at properties further out - they will cost less. Go through all your "stuff" and unload anything you don't need at flea markets or ebay - you'll be surprised how much money you have sitting around.

This is not a seller's market, and your type of area won't sell fast or high anyway. Try to find a realtor that specializes in your neighborhoods - he or she will have more contacts to buyers and to financers who are used to those conditions.

It took us more than six months to sell ours, and we just managed to get out of it without losing money.

We had gotten to the point where we figured that even if we lost some money, it still would have been better than renting.

Eugene, are there any good neighbors you can band together with to form an informal neighborhood watch, or even a formal one?

You are the best judge of your situtation, of course. It's just that the more good people who walk away from a transitional neighborhood, the worse it gets. That may seem obvious, but it is true.

If enough of you stand your ground, watching out for each other, calling the police at the first hint of trouble, testifying against them in court, etc., "they" will go away. The problem is, it takes time and commitment and a certain amount of risk tolerance. Of course, you don't want to jeopardize your family in the process, which is what makes standing one's ground an extremely difficult decision.

It can work. There was an urban neighborhood not far from here a few years back that had four or five families agree to set up video cameras in their front windows to cover the activity on the street 24-7 for a few weeks. Then they turned the tapes over to the police. Investigations and arrests followed, and the neighborhood became known as a "no fly zone" for the bad element.

Frank2135

What has happened is it was a nice quiet old neighborhood. Now all the old people have either moved into retirement communities or died and their houses sell for cheap and people rent them out through the government assistance program.
We have one good neighbor who works out of his home and is there during the day, he's a CCW holder and goes to a gym with some of the local police so he helps out a lot but we are out numbered by a large amount.
We have cleaned house and gotten rid of everything we don't need, went though and upgraded anything anyone complained about when the realtors did a showing.
Our biggest problem is the lack of police support, we have a 30 minute response time for them to come and take the report, slap the bad guy on the wrist and let them go.
Last year two drug addicts drove into my house. They got a $65 ticket for failure to maintain control, had enough time to walk back to their house and change clothes to get rid of the drug smell and my insurance ended up paying out 12k in damages.
My problem is while I can stand my ground, my wife and two kids are at home during the day while I'm not. Also to get cheaper home prices requires extending my drive to work to greater then the 30 minutes it is now so finding a house isn't going easy. We have dropped the price on ours to where were not going to get much profit at all which kills the down payment for the next house.
We have been standing our gound for the last couple years and fighting but the re-elections this week the same mayor was re-elected who is at the root of the problem. His philosophy is intergate the bad people with the good and they will get better so they close the government assisted housing in the inner city and move those people out to neighborhoods like ours. Well nine out of ten of the people they move don't want to change and just end up causing trouble. Were basically fighting city hall at the highest level and we don't have enough resources to do it so getting out is really our only other option.
So bugging out for any thing is also our other option. Our one good neighbor has a seroius relationship with a girl living in a suburb so he spends most of his time there when he's not working so its coming down to just us, I can't be there and on guard 24x7 and if we have another major storm like the one a couple years ago I don't want the rest of the hood to see our house as the only one with power and heat, they help themselves to our stuff enough as it is already.

the choice to go or stay is so personal i could never
suggest one way or the other what to do..the point of the
book is how people behave.. WW I was still recent
history for many people, they did not want to get caught up
in another war..the dislocation and break down of socal order
was just about as bad as what would have taken place if they
stayed home...students kill a teacher who was trying to get
them to safety--fighters strafe the roads--a guy from
Paris who saved his collection of china got run down while
standing on a street corner when he went back for more--
Churchill saw those problems and worked on plans to keep
the British from "bugging out"..i recall Blast did a post
of what it was really like on the roads during someting as
"simple" as a hurricane evacuation..on TV all i saw here
in Minnesota was a freeway jam and none of the real world
nutzy stuff Blast told us about..when i went camping last
spring i looked around at the nice remote car camping site
at the end of the road in northern Minnesota and thought how
it would make a good bug out site..it only took a second
to see that it would be full of local people who got there
first that that idea would not fly--in fact i thought i
would not even get out of my part of town let alone zoom
north on a freeway to hide out someplace..but--anyway--my
real world survival concerns revolve around what i might
do to get thru a wilderness canoe trip mishap..i posted
the book as food for thought--

Eugene, BUG OUT!!!! If you think there might be an emergency. I know that bugging out seems to be an unpopoular idea, but if you cant defend your property during normal times then please leave before you would have to during and emergency when the niehbors might get serious.

Yep, I know it's a personal decision, but it sounds like you are fighting a losing battle if you can't even rally Police support.

Get out, take the loss, consider moving to another area entirely and getting a different job. You never know, the job might pay better, the costs of living be lower, and safety monumentally higher if you move.

Oh, and you could always band with neighbors and file a class action suit against city hall. It sounds like their decisions have not only put you in jeapardy, but have also lowered your home value. I'm not one for lawsuits, but if enough folks ban together and you get outlying neighborhoods who are next on the hitlist to join in and get local media coverage, things might change. If you remove the government assistance and welfare programs, it's amazing how quickly bad elements can dry up and move on to their next free meal ticket.

You're screwed. My advice is to start looking for work in a location you can tolerate immediately, no job is worth risking the safety of your family like that. I've had to pack up and start over before too. It sucks, but it is better than the alternative, which is to be standing over a gravesite one day.

Never count on equity in a home, unless you are in the real estate business.

You'd better hurry up and prioritize what is important to you and then take some action. If you can't sell the house, well, there are always alternatives I won't elaborate on here. The imporant thing is do whatever you gotta do to get your family in a safe environment and keep them there. It ain't easy, but what one man can do, another can do.

Your only other choice is to turn your wife and kid(s) into killers so they can defend themselves when you are away. At least that's what I did.

You may not need a downpayment. If you're aggressive about looking, you may (and should) be able to find a property where the owner will finance.

You may also be able to find a property where the owner will allow you to rent until you've gathered a downpayment and can go to a lender for the balance.

I say this from experience - a longer drive to work is much easier when you know the homestead is safe and secure. Plus, there's no guarantee that you'll always have that job. I finally learned to put my family's welfare at the very top of the list - job convenience has dropped down almost to the bottom!

Benjammin's right. The only direction your situation is going is to worse.

I don't know what you do, but can't you do it somewhere else? Jobs aren't secure these days. Someone at the top makes a bad decision, and you're gone. Then what? No job and a house you can't sell.

Find a hungry realtor, not one of the big fat chains that don't care if they sell your place or not.

But mostly, balance your family against your current position: Would you be willing to give your house up free and clear to bring your wife or child back to life?

I'm very low on the financial food chain, so I can understand your feelings. But stress kills. Heavy guilt does, too.

I hope you can figure a way out of your situation. It won't be any better in five years.

Sue

Hey, Eugene… I’d like to reiterate something I posted in an earlier thread about bugging out.

There is a huge difference between bugging out and running away. Bugging out is a temporary, planned retreat from a bad situation. Running away is a knee-jerk reaction that has no planning or preparation behind it.

As long as you have a well-laid plan and the supplies to cover the logistics of a temporary bug-out situation, bugging out is fine. In fact, in a situation such as yours, it is probably even recommended. No one expects you to go running off to permanently “live off the land” because it is practically impossible to plan and prepare to do so.

"...in England,Churchill made plans to pervent mass exodus in
that country in case the Germans invaded..."

That would have been easy...burn the boats. Oh wait, there were not enough boats to handle a mass exodus from England...

Sounds like an interesting read anyway, I will look for it, thanks...

i sense your feeling of hopelessness. however, you do have many options to choose from.

i heard once that when one door closes - another opens. right now you get to choose what the next part of your life will be like. a great opportunity. for you and the family.

stay and fight? for what? the hood will get better? for whom? you describe it like it's circling the drain now. let it. move on.

housing options:

why do people swarm wal mart or costco? one reason - price. everything sells. at the right price.

ever seen a pink car on the road? somebody bought it, didn't they? i wouldn't. they did.

and sure, real estate prices are down in many areas. that's great! people forget that when they sell low - they'll be able to buy low! ask your real estate agent how much you need to lower the price to sell it tomorrow. if that's a figure you can live with - drop your price and sell it! move on. in two years you'll be patting yourself on the back telling yourself how smart you were to take the bull by the tail and face the situation. you'll be glad you did!

new housing: if you are a veteran there are gov't housing loans only for vets. here in ca we even have our own veteran's housing loans. maybe your state does too. low interest rates and low cost to get in. there are restrictions as to max loan amounts - but most areas, no problem.

the feds also offer FHA guaranteed loans. most realtors or money lenders can help you with that. low down payment. low interest rates. these were designed specifically for people to buy the american dream.

or as mentioned previously, maybe the seller of the home you buy would be willing "to carry the paper" - become the bank - for you. that's a win - win for both of you.

- you said you don't like the length of the drive to work. here in california it's not unusual for people to drive an hour to an hour and a half each way to work. that's the tradeoff - less expensive housing / better living environment vs. daily commute. i don't and wouldn't, but can / will you?

can you find work elsewhere - different part of the country - less expensive - than where you are? people have crossed continents and oceans to live in a better place. are you willing to do that? how bad is it for you?

i do feel for you. but i'd be looking for the next place to be.

i'm sure you've made many great decisions in your life. time is now to make another one and move on!

good luck and keep us posted.

bsmith

"If there is a doubt, there is no doubt." When the little voice says it is time to boogie, the only reason why it shouldn't be talking to itself is becuase it is in your head.