No matter which neighborhood you move to, the scummy nature of society’s worst people remains the same. Though some places are much better off statistically when it comes to petty crime, no neighborhood is ever really immune to thievery and other small crime. Thieving has been common since before the concept of houses even existed, and thus precautions and defensive measures have had to be taken to combat these thieves.
Coming home to a house that has been broken in to, and seeing multiple possessions missing is one of the worst things a person can encounter and really sours the mood for the rest of the day, if not for weeks or even months on end. Some people are not even in a financially stable enough situation to recover from the burglary, and may suffer from the fallout from it for years to come. This is why it is crucial that defensive measures be undertaken no matter where you reside.
Lock Your Doors at Night or When Out
Sometimes the simplest of precautions is just enough to prevent a big mishap from occurring. Some thieves are looking for the easiest target they can hit, and a house that has its doors unlocked, especially at night when everyone is asleep or at a time when the residents are out, is basically beckoning the thief inside. Just taking some time out to make sure the doors are locked before going to bed each night, or making sure to lock them behind you when heading out (no matter for how short a time) is a very good precautionary act.
Do Not Document Your Life Online
This is something a lot of you out there probably never thought about, but is definitely a thing that has been documented multiple times. People who document every waking moment of their lives are essentially writing an online manual on their home’s greatest security-related weaknesses and shortcomings.
Potential burglars study these posts from the residents of a particular house and memorize the patterns. They learn when each of the residents leave, when they come back home, when the house is completely vulnerable, and when it expected to be populated. These little nuggets of information are enough to remove the whole stress for getting the burglary over with as soon as possible, and thieves can then take their sweet time breaking and entering and leaving with your most valuable possessions.
Keep Some Lights Switched On When Out
Nothing is more of a dead giveaway that a house is most likely empty than all the windows being dark. Making it a habit to leave some of the rooms with their lights on whenever going out will make it seem like someone is home and deter thieves from making a move. In particularly dangerous neighborhoods, people often even leave a radio or a television turned on for the auditory illusion of someone being home at that time.
Install Security Cameras Outside
Nothing deters and demoralizes thieves more than the watchful eye of a camera mounted on a wall, a red light of death blinking menacingly under the dark lens. Installing security cameras outside your house, covering the front and back entrances as well as any first-floor windows that may provide easy entry, is one of the most surefire ways of stopping a burglary before it even happens.
The threat of being caught on camera is too much for most would-be thieves to handle. Thieves, especially ones that didn’t cover up their face, will turn tail and run off as soon as they hear the whirring motor of a spinning security camera or see its light wink at them from atop a window. And this is why the installation of these security cameras needs to be as obvious as possible. Using security footage to recognize and catch a thief is a security camera’s secondary purpose. Their main goal is to deter a burglary in the front place, and that is only possible if they are installed in the easiest to view places.
Get Yourself a Security System for Your House
What is even better than security cameras that have a chance of deterring a thief or at least providing ample footage to catch them later? A full-fledged security system that actively seeks to stop a burglary in its tracks and, if possible, have the thief caught then and there.
There are multiple types of home security systems out there; catering to all kinds of budgets and personal needs. You have simple motion sensor alarms that raise all Hell if they detect motion when you’re away, potentially alerting part of the neighborhood and forcing the thief to run away before anyone notices them. And then you have the really good ones that, instead of stopping a burglary midway, instead send an automated distress call to either the local police station, or at least the owner of the house so that they could call the cops instead. If you really splurge on a fancy system, you’ll even be able to tune in to your live security feed remotely to know for certain if there is a thief inside your house.
Keep Your House’s Exterior Lit Up
Keeping the exterior of your house, which includes the driveway and the front and back yards, properly lit up can also act as a deterrent for thieves. Now, we don’t mean you need to light up square inch like it was the fourth of July or something, but if every shadowy corner gets a light installed, it will work wonders at making a potential thief rethink his choice of targets.
If you don’t want to light up the exterior of your house too much, consider getting some motion sensing lights instead. They’re quite cheap, and will startle a thief and give him a nasty shock if he tries to sneak in through a corner shrouded in darkness and instead gets a face full of bright light. Talking to your neighborhood’s management authority about proper street lighting can also help keep the whole neighborhood safe from burglaries, as the whole street would become a safe spot instead of a giant hidey hole for a thief.
Conclusion
One running theme you might have noticed in the list above is that most methods of “defense” are actually trying to stop a theft from ever happening in the first place. And that is because that is the most desired method of defending a place of residence from thieves. You won’t need to actually defend your home if there was nothing to defend it from in the first place. Interested in bringing a slightly futuristic twist to keeping your home safe from thieves? Check out our post on using robots to protect your home from burglaries. Want to remain grounded in more tried and tested methods of home defense? Read all about how a basic home security system functions and how you can install one.