Best decision?

What are your goals? It would help to know more about your "big picture."

I am single, pretty young and have no financial obligations to myself. Between the two options, I am likely to take the new job unless the old job was funding my schooling to advance my career. Also, I live in Southern California. Practically everything is a "bit of a drive." Considering the traffic here and the current gas prices, any commute that makes me "Oh my" is worth mulling over.

Also, what about job security? How long do you see yourself in the new position?

Ok big picture is to get my np. Im going to have to get a loan to get my bsn either way. My current job is home health and its not always consistent, but of course I just got a full schedule. I have bills but I think I know what my button dollar can be.... I could be driving between 20 minutes and 1.5 hours with new job depending on the day.

I was in home health too. It was easy, predictable (for me since I had been working FT for a while) and it fit in with my school life. However, I think if it were not for networking, I would have had a very, very hard time finding the kind of position I wanted after I finished school. Home health did not lend itself well to transitioning to acute care in my job market. Technically, I had experience, but not the experience a nurse recruiter in acute care was looking for.

Maybe your job market is different though. See if you can use your home health experience to put yourself through school and land a job as a BSN RN or NP. This situation would be very nice since, as you say, you make ends meet and you have a comfortable commute.

Ok. Any more advice?