Keeping Your Home Safe While It's Alone 🔓🎄
It’s nearly that time when we head off for a much earned and needed holiday and the perfect way to ruin that would be to return to find your home has been broken in to … or getting a call mid way with the news.
While many homes now have security camera systems / video doorbells and other cloud based smart gadgets to keep an eye on what’s going on, here’s a few tricks that anyone can put in place to reduce the risk of unwanted visitors. It’s all simple things that we’ve all heard before, but a checklist at this time of year is never a bad idea!
Mail & Bins
An overflowing mailbox is a full on announcement of an empty house, so see if a neighbour or a friend can pop by regularly to collect your mail for you. Additionally if the bin collection day doesn’t time up nicely with your departure date, a lone bin on the road well before or after bin collection day is a good indication that nobody has been, or will be home for a while, so if you can, ask your neighbour to take care of your bins for you too.
Find a house-sitter
Might be a bit last minute now, but even organising someone you trust who is willing to pop into your place every now and then throughout your trip is a great way to confuse would be intruders and peace of mind for you while you’re away.
Set your lights to a timer
If the lights are on, somebody’s home. At least that’s a fair assumption when assessing a street at night. It’s easy to identify an unoccupied home if it’s early in the evening, and the entire house is dark. Investing in an electrical timer is an easy and cost-effective way to mimic your usual light routine to help it look like someone is home.
Leave the radio or TV on
The sound of chatting or music from inside a house is an excellent crim-repellant. Leaving a radio on in the kitchen or the TV on in the living room will offer subtle signs of life; if a anyone up close to your home and hears it, it’ll make them think twice about breaking in.
Prune your garden
An unruly lawn and garden can often indicate an empty house. So if you’re heading off on holidays, give your lawn a quick mow and prune back the bushes to keep it maintained while you are away. If you’re heading off for a longer trip book a regular lawn mow - it will also mean you’re not coming back from the trip to a massive garden catch up!
Ask your neighbour to park their car in your driveway
If you’re taking your car with you or parking it inside your garage for safe-keeping, ask your neighbour to park their car in your driveway intermittently over the course of your holiday. A car out the front usually means somebody’s home, which is cause for pause for most.
Remove the spare key
Be sure to remove your spare key from its hiding spot and either lock it up inside or leave it with a neighbour. No matter how well-hidden you think it is, leaving it outside while you’re away is not worth the risk.
Be mindful of your social media
While holidays are #instaworthy, just be mindful of your social media privacy settings to ensure that your absence from home is not publicly known. Or if you have a more significant following, just hold off posting too much that reveals you’re away from home for an extended period of time and save your posts for when you return
Blinds/Curtains
It can feel natural to close your blinds when locking up your house ahead of a trip away, but a house with all the curtains and blinds closed during the day and night is a tell-tale sign that no one is home, making it appealing to a thief. Think about how your curtains and blinds usually are when you’re home and try and keep them that way. This may mean leaving some open and some closed.