Intimate partner and community violence are an unrelenting presence in the lives of homeless Latina and African American women and their children. Impoverished neighborhoods are inundated with public acts of violence that impact daily life in profound ways. Sexual violence, drug use, gang violence, child abuse, and hypermasculinity are enacted visibly for all to see. Based on a four‐year ethnography of homeless families in San Francisco, this research examines the gendered and racialized violence of poverty experienced by homeless mothers in San Francisco. Women in this research have endured physical and sexual violence as children and are typically victims of adult intimate partner violence. This research presents the excruciating narratives of violence and degradation suffered by homeless women of color. Their lived experiences illustrate that for many women of color, becoming homeless is a direct result of racialized poverty and chronic family violence. Framed within the intersectionality perspective, these women's stories advance our understanding of the interlocking nature of race, gender, and class oppression.