Bless you and your family.
Homes nowadays can be put up so quickly and affordable, that it would be a great experience to live on base and not pay for housing, nor heat, nor water, nor electricity. And all of that is feasible.
The Army Corps of Engineers can work wonders in very short times. And today, there are modular homes that are very. very pleasant to live in, and affordable for DOD to purchase.
There is really no reason to push service members off-base if they have nice housing and base schools that exceed all public schools. I can see waiting lines at recruitment offices to get into that sort of deal.
The only reason to buy housing off-base is to build equity. But that should come after a service member has committed to making the military a career.
I should specify this was many years ago. Now, I am sure it is much different with the specifics, but as they say, you either live in base housing (hard to get) or get money in your paycheck and find a place off-base.
My dad did both, but being an officer, he had more financial flexibility, but...with six kids to support and a stay at home mom, that was a challenge for him.
Before and after we went overseas, he worked five nights a week at a large department store chain near Washington DC (GEM) as a second job to make ends meet. He would get up at 5:00 AM to work his daytime Navy job, and go straight to work at the department store after, finally getting home at 10:30 PM.
God bless that hardworking man. He wasn’t a demonstrative father, but my mother would say later that he loved us all very much, and he showed it as he could by working that hard to support us.
I can’t imagine how enlisted families can make ends meet living off base...but they must, because they do.