Home burglary prevention Tips

[Nabr33]

Back door breakins are the most common way of entry. 1st floor windows are the second way.

- Light lots of light! Keep a motion sensor light on your back yard, any entry points, and driveway. High-pressure sodium lights and mercury vapor lights are economical and illuminate a larger area than regular incandescent lights.
- Keep your front and back porch lights on at night front porch light is added outside street security
- Leave a radio or TV on playing,
- Big dog
- Keep gates locked
- Lock your back storm doors at all times when you are not home (the more sturdy the lock and door on your strom door the better)
- If you have a wood door, get brass strikeplates that go under the door knob and dadbolt. Get the kind that wrap around the edge of the door. They will stop someone from chiping away wood.
- Get an extra thick stike plate with very long screws. Standard screws only go a few inches. You need screws that go deeper into the structure of the house and into the 2x4 studs. Most doors are simply kicked in. The wood splits and the lock never breaks.
- Never leave a key in a deadbolt lock where someone could break glass to turn it.
- Never use a deadbolt lock with a knob where someone could break glass to turn it.
- Install an audible alarm as well as a monitored alarm
- Secure windows. Window pinning (inserting a nail above the window) and window tracking (placing apiece of wood in the track of a window so it won’t open) are two inexpensive ways to secure double-hung windows.
- Use very heavyduty hardware and locks on your crawlspaces and storage sheds.
- keep large trailers,boats, lawnmowers, and other machinery locked to a permanent structure with a logging chain.
- keep crawlspaces and sheds locked at all times
- Keep ladders locked away, so they cannot be used to access second story windows
- Close your blinds at night or when you’re not home. This minimizes a burglar’s opportunity to “shop around.”
- Arrange easy lines of sight into your yard for neighbors
- Overgrown landscaping is an invitation to criminals and provides them with the perfect place to hide. Utilize the 3ft./6ft. rule when planting trees and shrubs. Trim tree branches up to six feet off the ground and shrubs down to three feet. This creates a “window effect” in your yard and minimizes hiding places for burglars. You might also consider planting thorny shrubs or bushes beneath windows.
- Record serial #s on your electronic equipment
- Scratch your license number into all of your electronics. You should make it very large and deep on computers, to deter thieves from taking it. Once the data and personal info is gone.
Call the police whenever you see someone suspicious. It's better to be safe than sorry.

- Never answer the door without looking. this is not just for safety, but because often people will use the opportunity to look in your house, or convince you to let them in your house.
- Do not answe the door for solicitors or people asking to borrow landscaping tools , or to perform landscaping. This is often a ploy to case your house or your shed.
- Do not leave guns in the house when you are not home without a trigger lock or stored in a gun safe. Stolen guns are a hot market, bring a lot of money, and also typically end up being used by the burglars to commit more brazen and violent acts, or are sold to another criminal who will. Most guns used in robberies and homicides are stolen guns.