A good family is supportive and loving, even when you make different decisions than they would have.

What would you do if your family had always given you a hard time for remaining in a high cost of living area after they moved to a more affordable area, but then they started having financial problems anyway?

That is what happened to the man in this story, so he feels justified that he made the right choice, even after taking years of attitude from his family.

AITAH for feeling justified in my choice because the rest of my family’s lives are falling apart?

I come from a lower middle-class family who grew up in what I consider to be a beautiful area.

Attractive neighborhoods attract wealthy people.

It has become a desirable area to live, so a lot of higher income individuals have moved into the area, especially over the past 20 years, which has significantly raised the cost of living.

Because of that, many younger generations who grew up in this area have chosen to move to more affordable parts of the country because they have been priced out the area. That includes the majority of my family.

It is hard when the cost of living in an area goes up faster than your income.

Many of them were struggling just to get by, myself included, so I understood the reason for their decision. I chose to stay in the area for the same reasons why so many new people were moving into the area.

Beautiful landscapes, nice houses, safe neighborhoods, good schools, ect. There is a reason why the area is desirable.

His hard work is finally paying off.

It took me years of hard work to establish a good career with good wages and get to a place where I can comfortably live in the area without struggling.

During that time, my family, who moved away, criticized my choice to stay in the area. They insisted that it was a stupid choice and that I should move where they did.

Wow, his family seems really petty.

They bragged about their new homes, new cars, new toys, almost anything new they purchased saying things like “oh, that’s right, you can’t afford this because you’re still there”.

While I was shopping for a house, they would reply to any home I showed them with a listing in their area that was about half the cost.

What kind of family does this?

When I did purchase a house, they criticized the size of it, the age of the it, the size of the property, everything that they could to justify why it was still a bad choice to stay in the area and how much better their area is.

That same behavior happened with everything. Every achievement and accomplishment I made was laughed at and dismissed because “it would’ve been easier if you just moved here”.

It is all coming back to bite them.

Now recently, all the skeletons in their closets have been coming out to party. It comes out that some of them are on the verge of loosing their homes. Their neighborhoods are starting to become overrun with high crime rates and drug issues making it unsafe to live there.

Constant problems with the schools because of lower funding and education standards. They’re having to travel further and further to find work, which is resulting in less income.

Life is hard when bad decisions catch up with you.

They are living with overwhelming debt, which they can’t keep up with now due to the lower income. Not to mention the personal conflicts going on within their households.

Some of them are talking about moving to another “more affordable” part of the country again, but really can’t afford it.

I mean, he isn’t wrong here.

I told them “You moved there because you couldn’t afford it here, now you want to go somewhere else because you can’t afford it there? Did you ever think the problem is yourselves, not the area?”

They told me that I don’t understand what it’s like and how bad the area is getting.

He is just treating them like they treated him.

They’re mad at me now because they say I’m acting pompous and callous just because I’m not struggling like they are. I told them that I chose to stay in a thriving area and make it work, rather than chasing what looked like an easy fix. Now they think I’m just acting like a jerk.

So, AITAH for feeling justified in my choice because the rest of my family’s lives are falling apart?

While rubbing their faces in their mistake is entirely justified, it won’t help to maintain a good relationship with family. But he is definitely not out of line for privately feeling justified.

Read on to see what the people in the comments have to say about it.

I agree with this commenter.

Exactly, let other people live their lives.

This family has some jealousy issues for sure.

He should have taken the high road.

Yup, ignore their stupidity.

Ignore critical family members and you win in the end.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.