How to protect your home from burglary guide, Protect your property in Texas, Houston break-in lock tips, USA house safety advice

How To Protect Your Home from Burglary or Break-Ins If You Travel a Lot

13 May 2022

The thought of leaving your home and belongings behind can be unsettling.

The anticipation of checking in on the house from a new town or being able to come back to a place you know so well can be exciting and nerve-wracking at once.

If you’re someone who travels often for work, studies, or leisure, it can be even harder to leave your home for extended periods of time.

Fortunately, there are several simple precautions you can take to protect your home from burglary or break-ins if you travel frequently for long periods.

Simple Steps to Protecting Your Home While Away

Whether you’re traveling for work or play one of the top things on your mind will be is your home safe.

With pets and plants are already taken care of, the last thing on your mind is your home. There are easy and efficient ways to ensure that your home is protected when you’re not there.

Make it Look Like Someone is at Home

One of the easiest solutions is to make it look like you’re home. With the increasing number of Smart Home devices, this has become so much easier to accomplish.

Make sure to stop mail delivery until you get back or arrange for someone to collect it for you. Don’t forget the newspaper either. Mail piling up in the mailbox is a red flag that you’re not home.

Get your lights on timers or an automated routine. Don’t just have them come on at dusk either. Patterns are easy to detect. Lights turning on at more random times throughout the day and even your TV or radio is far more convincing that someone is home.

Have a car park in your driveway and make sure your grass is cut right before you leave.

Install a Monitored Home Security System

Having door sensors, locks, window sensors, motion detectors, cameras, and video doorbells are just the beginning.

Why ruin your vacation by checking your notifications for every breeze that sets off your motion detectors?

What if your reception is bad and you miss a notification?

Buy yourself some peace of mind and take advantage of systems like Smith Thompson’s security services that will monitor all of it for you.

With 24/7 monitoring, these systems will notify you and the company in the event of an alarm. It doesn’t matter if it’s a potential break-in or a fire. If they know you’re not home, they will take care of calling the authorities and you and fixing the issue fast.

Lock Your Doors and Windows

This seems obvious, but some may not think of this. Locking your doors is a no-brainer, but did you think to lock the garage, the first-floor windows, the mail slot, and the pet door?

According to FBI statistics, 34% of break-ins occur right through the front door and another 22% via the back door.

If you have an automatic garage door opener, consider disconnecting the opener until after you return.

Don’t Share Your Vacation or Trip

With the advent of attention-grabbing social media, everyone is beyond excited to share their vacation pictures online but that’s a bad idea.

Thieves will monitor social media for those stunning vacation photos you posted to make your friends jealous. Those friends won’t be jealous of the break-in and burglary though because someone knew you wouldn’t be home to stop them.

Some people do this for a living. Don’t think that they can’t figure out where you live either. It’s not as hard as you think it is.

Local thieves monitor local social media for this reason alone.

Save your photos of your trips for after you get home. In advance, save the public countdown announcing that you’re leaving town to everyone as well.

Talk to Your Neighbors

If you have a good relationship with your neighbors, which is highly recommended, let them know you’re going to be away.

The thing about neighbors is if it can happen to you, it can happen to them too. They’re usually more than willing to keep an eye on your home and call the authorities with any activity they deem suspicious.

If you know them really well, give them your number and a spare key, just in case.

Alarm System

Alarm systems are handy and if you have one make sure to let any monitoring company knows you’ll be away.

Even if you don’t have one, putting up a fake sign is still a deterrent to break-ins. Be sure to never display the exact company you use (or don’t use). Some potential burglars are savvy enough to use this information to research ways around it.

No Hidden Key

Whether you use a recognized hide-a-key method or think you made one that no one will figure out it’s not a good idea.

If a criminal thinks you’re not home, then they also believe they have all the time in the world to track down that spare key you hid in your garden.

Before you leave, grab that hidden key, and give it to the neighbor that’s watching your place for you.

How to protect your home from burglary Conclusion

Thinking someone may try to break into your home while you’re away? No one ever said getting ready for vacation would be easy.

Fortunately, there are a variety of precautions and steps you can take to protect your home from an intruder. The most important thing is to always keep your doors and windows locked and remove any valuables from sight.

If you do decide to travel a lot for work or personal reasons, consider installing one or more types of monitored home security systems. These systems will notify you and the company in the event of an alarm.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a potential break-in or a fire. If they know you’re not home, they will take care of calling the authorities and you and fixing the issue fast.

Comments on this guide to How to protect your home from burglary article are welcome.