Pittsburgh | Imamother

amother

Cantaloupe

Wed, Feb 07 2024, 11:01 am

amother OP wrote:

Can someone tell me what the Pittsburgh community is like?
Is it affordable?
Is there a yeshivish presence? JPF?

Would it be welcoming enough for a single mother?

TIA!

I hv family there.
Super warm & friendly. The Kollel has yeshivish families, plus some stayed on so there's a few more. If you sent to Hillel Academy it's definitely more modern but you will find some yeshivish or jpf kids in most of the classes but class sizes can be pretty small.
There's also a very large Chabad Community there.

I know nothing about housing prices or rent but I do know that the kosher grocery is pretty expensive because there's only one and people sometimes will bring back food from larger communities.

amother

Green

Wed, Feb 07 2024, 11:07 am

Its largely lubavitch and JPF with a large leaning towards MO. There is a small kollel (less than 10 families) and they are yeshivish and probably another handful or two of families that are yeshivish leaning. I do feel they would be welcoming to a single mother but being that the yeshivish community is so small, those not part of the kollel itself may feel left out at times when there are kollel only internal events...there are also plenty of events that are run for the community but Ive heard the sentiment expressed, so Im just mentioning it, if you largely identify as yeshivish but arent part of the kollel, its a dynamic that does exist. If you have children, you'll want to get a better understanding if the school(s) will meet your needs.

MsShona

Sun, Feb 11 2024, 2:27 pm

So I'm responding as someone who was born in the Pittsburgh area -- but never lived in Squirrel Hill (which is really THE Jewish neighborhood people are referring to when they think of 'Jewish Pittsburgh'). I co-sign what another commenter said about Pittsburgh having a distinctly Lubavitch flavor. There are definitely non-Lubavitch yeshivish and MO families. However, Lubavitch has the strongest presence. Yeshiva schools (Lubavitch) are very popular. I know of a few families who were not Lubavitch, but opted for their children to go to Yeshiva other than Hillel due to hashkafa (keep in mind though -- this was 15-20 years ago; maybe Hillel has a more right-learning flavor to it now, I don't know).

I will also be very honest here and say that compared to other Pittsburgh neighborhoods, Squirrel Hill is one of the most expensive neighborhoods in the city. Pittsburghers are promoting the neighboring Greenfield neighborhood as being more affordable -- but the only shul/minyan in Greenfield is Lubavitch (see the trend here?). I am also a single mom. I lived in White Oak -- which is a much older Jewish community, but also tiny. It is MUCH more affordable though, and they have busses to send the kids to school in Pittsburgh. But what I've seen time and time again that as soon as they can, young families in White Oak move to Squirrel Hill as soon as they can afford to -- for a plethora of reasons. I myself chose to leave the Pittsburgh area altogether. As a single mother, I just couldn't make it work (commuting around Pittsburgh is difficult -- I worked downtown and my commute was around 1 hour one-way). I live in Harrisburg, PA now -- although no that my kids are school age, I'm exploring other options because my oldest needs special education support.

There are lots of friendly people in Pittsburgh though! Just weighing in with my $0.02.

amother

Obsidian

Sun, Feb 11 2024, 2:33 pm

I live in pgh and love it. I live in greenfield and there are some litvish families who live here also. They walk to squirrel hill for minyanim on shabbos but it's not a far walk I do it all the time. Hillel the yeshivish school is very modern as in they serve cholov stam and is coed up until I think 4th grade.

Edited to add
Housing prices in greenfield are much cheaper than squirrel hill, around 300k for a 4 bedroom house with a yard