Home Safety Preparedness
Protect your home and your loved ones by taking key steps to minimize your home becoming a target. Below we’ll cover a number of best practices. They will vary based on your location such as whether you live in a rural or urban area, in a neighborhood with homes next to you or homes miles away.
Review these best practices and then do some more searching and improve your foundation of home safety. We’ll share with you some of our favorite videos covering safety practices.
Don’t be a Target – 8 Suggestions, pick 2 new ones
We’ve listed the following suggestions in order of the costs: LOW COST (under $100) – MEDIUM COST (under $300) – HIGH COST (over $300)
1. It is almost too simple but it must be listed as a reminder: Lock your doors. Do not substitute your family’s safety for convenience. Set your alarm. When you’re home, whether it’s day or night, set your home alarm. Break ins are 6% more likely to occur between 6am and 6pm when home owners are expected to be at work. NO COST
2. Keep the outside of your home tidy so it doesn’t look like a house that wouldn’t have an alarm system. Also, don’t keep heavy objects out front that can be used to break down a door or a window such as cinder blocks. LOW COST
3. Have alarm stickers on your windows or signs in your yard. Even if you don’t have an alarm, thieves are interested in easy targets. LOW COST – $4.99 Amazon
4. Strengthen your door latch striker plate. This is the weak spot the breaks when doors are kicked in. Typically these are installed with short screws. This is one easy upgrade – remove the small screws, pre-drill deeper holes, and install longer deck screws such as 3-inch screws. LOW COST $4.98 Home Depot
5. Nightlock Kick-Plate: This door security makes it extremely difficult to kick down a door. Whereas strengthening your striker plate will require a few more kicks to break the door open (which buys you time to orient yourself to the situation), the Nightlock system reduces the chances of your door opening in the first place. MEDIUM COST $125 Amazon
6.There are a number of alarm systems that are relatively inexpensive, check into options in your area. Some like Ring allow you to purchase the system with an option for monthly monitoring. You can purchase just the window sensors you need and setup the system on your own. MEDIUM COST $189.99 Amazon
7. Motion sensor lights and cameras: These can be purchased separately or as part of an alarm system. Outdoor cameras give you the ability to check on your yard whether you’re home or at the office. They serve as your early warning system. MEDIUM COST $249.99 Amazon
8. Dogs: Big dogs are an excellent deterrent as they are typically very responsive to noises around the house. And in terms of deterrents, remember, thieves are looking for easy targets. Even if you don’t have a dog, you can still put up a yard sign (<— low cost). HIGH COST (Signs $10-15 Amazon)
One layer of security isn’t enough as you can see in the video below. You can see how the the homeowners would have benefited from the additional support behind the door striker plate (in this case down below). A kick plate would have made a difference. The second video shows the kick plate put to the test.
Safety Habits – How are you doing here?
1. Don’t advertise that you are away – Have a neighbor bring in your garbage cans if needed, don’t let mail or newspapers pile up (if you’re still receiving those!)
2. Close your blinds at night when you are home – Our security depends on us utilizing what we have available to us. How many times have you seen lights on inside a house through open blinds? You can see who’s in the room, what is on the television, etc. Don’t give potential intruders visual access to your family.
3. Have a neighbor buddy system to pick up packages for one another when shipments arrive when you’re not home. No one likes the idea of having their packages stolen from their entry way, and thieves do not even care if they are spotted on camera these days. So don’t make it easy and save yourself the worry. (PS Have 2 neighbors to call on in case one isn’t home.)
