How To Make Your Home Seem Less Attractive To Burglars?

The key to home security often boils down to making a home uninviting to burglars.

Experiencing a burglary can be a devastating experience impacting both you and your family long after the unfortunate event took place. Fortunately, the application of several preventative measures can significantly reduce your home’s risk of becoming a burglary statistic.

There are numerous ways you can burglar-proof your home. However, encouraging burglars to avoid your home to start with greatly lessens your chances of suffering a break in.

Prevention may be more manageable than you believe. Everyone has heard the phrase that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Regarding burglary deterrence, this cure could come in the form of simply ensuring your residence does not come across as an easy target.

Burglary Prevention Tips

Attractive, carefully manicured landscaping like hedges of bushes situated adjacent to or near your home might increase the property’s aesthetic appeal. That said, such décor could also serve as an open invitation to prospective burglars.

Thieves revel in the opportunity to hide in shrubbery near windows and doors. This enables these unscrupulous individuals a safe place to wait in hiding and strike when the moment suits them.

While landscaping should be well-maintained, such plant life should not be large enough to provide safe harbor. Never obstruct your ability to adequately view what is taking place on your property’s confines.

Typically, burglars desire properties offering them a secure springboard during the break in process. Therefore, adorning brush should be pruned down to where no individual of average height or weight can blend into the foliage.

Once again, it is worth reiterating that special attention be given to landscaping near access points like windows and doors. Additionally, you should not sleep on trimming the hedges near garage doors or windows.

Shrubs not only enable burglars to remain out of sight but also allow malfeasance individuals a perfect observation point. Professional criminals do their homework and study the habits and schedules of their intended victims. Moreover, they will conduct a visual inventory of your property and notate the items they wish to swipe.

Under no circumstances should large, leafy bushes or trees be situated close to your property. Such foliage creates an even greater fortress for thieves to linger and observe. Eventually, these lawbreakers will know your routine left, right, and center and pick the perfect time to strike.

Avoid Visual Enticement

Keeping your property clean and debris free could also deter break-ins. Signs of a poorly maintained property, such as unkempt windows, overgrown foliage, a stuffed mailbox, or newspapers piling up on the driveway or front steps often gives thieves the impression that you are not home.

Such advice also applies to the residence’s interior. Stacks of papers or refuse visible on a doormat inside offers prospective offenders similar impressions and could invite trouble.

Should a burglar venture close enough to take a peek inside, you are implored to ensure any valuable property remains firmly out of sight. By rearranging furniture, you might suitably disguise larger, more luring possessions like electronic equipment.

That said, for smaller items like jewelry, you might opt to invest in a safe. Holdings like these not only carry significant monetary value but necessitate less heavy lifting, time, or care to remove during someone’s’ escape. Additionally, treasures hidden in a safe may be easier to insure.

Educate Family Members

Adequate home protection requires participation by each and every resident. This includes your children. Even young people should be properly educated regarding burglar-proofing tips.

Install An Alarm

Many professional thieves are deterred by visible alarm systems. Therefore, investing in a notable system often proves valuable. These networks vary in terms of features.

Most are designed to emit a loud siren when sensors are tripped. However, the most optimal networks are those connecting directly with police and other emergency services. In such cases, said agencies are immediately beckoned and typically respond within minutes.

Naturally, however, you must learn to properly navigate the system. Moreover, you must remember to activate such networks when you or any other member of your family exits the home or retires for the evening.

Fasten All Locks

This advice may be simple. Arguably, however, such actions are most direct and effective. You must ensure that all doors and windows are firmly locked and secure prior to leaving the premises or during the overnight hours.

It might be difficult to believe but a significant percentage of burglaries occur because homeowners simply neglected to ensure their home’s doors and windows were firmly secure.

Most windows are equipped with locks. That said, if such features are missing, you should promptly have them installed. Numerous locks can be fitted. There are several factors that might play into choosing the most appropriate fasteners. A professional window or security company can help you choose the security features most befitting your needs.

To secure your windows even further, industry experts recommend placing a wooden or metal dowel inside the structure’s track. Such action renders pushing the window open more difficult and strenuous.

Exterior doors are often a preferred entry method. Ergo, such components should be equipped with two locks. These features should be deadbolt, in addition to those opened with a key.

Locked doors are useless if you leave a spare key in an easily accessible location. Therefore, said security item should not be kept under the doormat, inside a mailbox, or any other common location an experienced burglar would automatically check. Such items are often safest in the hands of a trusted friend or neighbor.

Invest In Outdoor Lighting

Exterior lighting is crucial. The illumination network can vary from something as simple as a porch lamp to an intricate system of lights lining your property. The important issue to remember is that darkness is a burglar’s friend.

If you cannot afford an expensive security system, occasionally exterior lights equipped with motion sensors might prove as just effective a theft-deterrent. These features turn on when sensing motion. Such action could startle and chase away many would-be thieves.

Conclusion

Being burglarized can be traumatic and have lasting emotional and financial impacts upon you and your family. That said, by adhering to the preceding steps, you can greatly reduce your home’s chances of becoming a crime statistic. Though some measures require a financial investment, many simply call on homeowners to put in a little extra effort and a lot of common sense.

About The Author: Written by Steve of workingthedoors website.  He helps share advice and methods about protecting your home from intruders, keeping your home, your possessions and your family, safe. 

Photo by Jon Moore on Unsplash