In part 2 of this home safety series, we discuss some simple tips for making your home less of a target.
Make Your House Look Occupied
The best way to keep a burglar away from your home while you are gone is to make it appear that you never left. Start by temporarily stopping the delivery of the daily mail and newspaper. When papers are allowed to pile up on the front porch or mail boxes start to overflow, criminals are alerted that people have gone out of town. Put timers on lights inside the house so they turn on every night. The same can be done for television sets will help give the appearance that people are at home. Once you have things in place to make the house look occupied, remember to do one final thing: turn off the ringer for your phone. All the work you have done to create the illusion that you are home can be shattered by a ringing phone that is never answered.
Ask a friend or relative to stop by your home periodically if you will be gone for several days. This allows them to keep an eye on the place, and will show any criminals who might be watching that someone is going inside on a regular basis. If no one is able to do this for you, try to leave a parked car in the driveway while you are away to make it seem like someone is at home.
Burglars who think they have found an easy target can break into your home quickly. One way to discourage this is by to put up signs or stickers that state you have a working security system in place. The last thing a criminal wants is to set off an alarm, and if they see the signs the will think your home is not worth the effort.
Safety When You Are Home
Just because you don’t leave home for the holidays doesn’t meant your house is automatically safe. A very common holiday mistake is to make it obvious that you have expensive items still in their boxes within your living room. Of course most people would assume that every home has a variety of gifts inside during the holidays, but if a criminal can actually see them they will be far more tempted to break in. Never place wrapped gifts where they can be seen through a window. Doing so lets a criminal know exactly where everything is, and they may be inclined to break that window, grab what they can and run off.
A second part of keeping your holiday treasures hidden is to avoid putting large empty boxes in front of the house. Even if you store the gifts away from windows, the box itself will tell a burglar that you have something they may want in your home. Keep the boxes hidden until the holidays are over, and then recycle the packaging. By that point, criminals are not as active about looking for goods they may want to steal.
Don’t let your holiday season be ruined by a law breaker. Make sure a criminal can never tell that you have expensive items inside, or that you have left town for a few days. Keep safe and enjoy the holiday season.
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