How Burglar-Proof Is Your Home Before You Go On Holiday?

With summer on our doorsteps, we often leave door and windows open to allow the air to cool our homes. With basic checks around the home, including remembering to secure doors and windows before we leave the house, have you put yourself in the burglar’s position and looked at your home for potential danger spots?

Here we look at ways some opportunists will take advantage of our carelessness.

Mow Your Lawn

A sign of an empty house is a lawn that hasn’t been mown for a while. You may simply have arranged to go on holiday for several weeks, or even months. Ask one of your neighbours, a friend or family to mow your lawn for you, or arrange for a gardener to keep it neat and let a neighbour know. Don’t forget to thank your neighbours with some nice duty free!

Front Door Burglar Alarm

Give the potential burglar a reason to stay away by fitting a good quality and visible door alarm system. If the front door is forced, the alarm will soon frighten them away upon hearing the siren.

Mix Up Your Daily Routine

You never know if you’re being watched by one of these lazy thieves. Leaving the house at 11am and returning at 6pm may leave you easy prey. You shouldn’t need to stay in your house all day and night, but try to vary your day-to-day movements if possible.

Exterior Security Lights

An excellent choice of deterrents for burglars is to invest in some outdoor floodlights. Many floodlights are installed with a motion sensor, and often scares thieves away for fear of being identified or photographed. During installation, ensure that the lights are positioned out of reach to stop thieves from removing bulbs, or dismantling the system altogether. You should also be able to set the system with a timer to set the lights to come on at a certain time of day. Be careful not to upset neighbours by flooding their property too with your security lights!

Window and Door Locks

The most obvious point of access to your home is through the windows. Burglars have a keen eye for damaged or open windows in your house. Invest in replacing faulty or broken double glazing window frames, and buy window and upvc door locks. A visit to your home improvement shop who have home security products will have a choice for many types of windows, or find a specialist who can visit your home to assess the best systems for your windows and doors.

Planning

If you are planning an extended trip away from your home, make plans to ensure that regular visitors to the home are aware that you will be away. For example, if you have newspaper or milk deliveries, cancel them until further notice. A burglar may spot a pile of newspapers in your porch that haven’t been touched for several weeks. You could also ask a neighbour to check on your post, and in many cases a spare key is left with them – if they can be trusted! Leave a phone number that you can be contacted on – and make sure you switch off services to the home, such as water, gas etc.

The Professional Thief

If you make sure your home is as secure as you can, thieves will tend not to bother breaking in – as the nature of the thief is to always choose the easy and quick option. But at least you will have peace of mind if you have installed secure locks and alarms.