How Safe Is Your Home From Criminals?
By Charles Montaldo, About.com
Is your home an easy target for a robber or burglar? Are you doing all you can to protect your home and your family from criminal intrusion? Is there more that you can do that would cause a potential burglar to decide to move on to another target?
Answering these 20 Questions can help you determine if you are doing all that you can to make your home safe or if there are other prevention measures that you may not have considered.
- Are your house address numbers clearly visible to emergency response personnel from the street?
- Do you keep your ladders and tools in a locked garage or storage shed?
- When you go out in the evening do you leave several lights on inside your home?
- Do you have deadbolt locks on all of your exterior doors?
- Do you have a home inventory of all your personal property stored in a safe, fire-proof place?
- Are the windows and doors of your home clearly visible from the street or from your neighbor's yard?
- Are the entries into your home well lighted all night long?
- Did you re-key all the locks in your house after you moved in?
- Are your entry doors made of steel, solid core wood (at least 1-3/4 inches) or metal wrapped wooden doors?
- Do you have a 'Neighborhood Watch' or similar program established in your area?
- Do you keep an extra set of keys with a trusted neighbor, rather than hiding a set outside your home?
- Do your exterior doors fit their frames tightly, with no more than 1/8 inch space between the door and frame?
- Are your sliding glass doors secured with locks, jammed with a dowel rod from inside, and protected from being easily lifted out from their frames?
- Do all of your entry doors have a peephole with a wide-angle viewer?
- When you are gone, do you have timers on some of your lighting to turn the lights off and on to create the illusion that someone is home?
- Can anyone gain access through a mail slot, dryer vent, or pet entrance?
- Have you installed extra, motion-sensitive security lighting around your home?
- Do you shred or otherwise destroy your junk mail before discarding it?
- Have you installed a home alarm system?
- Do you have at least one telephone (cell phone) that can be operated without a 'land line?'
Basically, the lower your score the more opportunities you have to increase the security of your home against burglars and other criminals.
