Home Security

So, you have been working from home for the past two years. Maybe you barely left home in that time. Then you are probably one of many people realizing that when you are not at home for more than six to nine hours a day, things are not as secure as they probably seemed. 

If that is the case, you are probably wondering: How can you keep your belongings safe in that time? How can you be sure a thief does not get into your home? And what if someone does break in? What measures can you take to deal with that as best as possible?

All reasonable questions, and all questions Melissa home security company Smith Thompson has thought a lot about. We will walk you through them one by one.

How to Keep Your Home Safe

Making sure that no one steals anything from your home while you are at work starts with making sure that no one can get into your home. This can be accomplished in a few ways, some of which are more practical than others. The first step is securing doors and windows. 

But securing doors and windows does not work how you think it might. To begin with, while locks of various kinds are important, there are few locks that can truly keep out a dedicated thief. Locks are simply a barrier that takes time to clear, not a guarantee.

Safety Locks and Their Downside

It is possible for you to perfectly secure locks, there are just drawbacks to doing so. They are called “safety locks”, and they are plastic accessories that basically prevent a lock from unlocking. The issue here is probably pretty obvious: What if you need to use the lock? 

That is why most people use safety locks on windows, but not doors. This means that your door presents a clear path into your home for any thief who knows how to lockpick. It also means that there is no other way in. They could break a window, but that happens less than you think. 

What you need first and foremost is an alarm system. A home without an alarm system is just a place for a thief to relax while they steal stuff. But if you get an alarm system, then suddenly the thief is on a timer. Remember how we said locks are just barriers that time to get through?

An alarm system is a great first step to getting your home safe because it is not only easy to manage but will generally immediately dissuade thieves from attempting to rob you.

What if Someone Does Break In?

If someone does break into your home, whether you have an alarm or not, then they probably have a plan to steal specific things. The most commonly stolen things by thieves are: 

  • Electronics
  • Cash
  • Jewelry
  • Small valuables

If “small valuables” seems vague, that is because it is meant to be vague. If the most valuable thing you have in your home is a life-sized sculpture of Darth Vader, then you can be pretty sure that a thief will not steal that, as it would require more than five people and a lot of time.

But if the most valuable thing in your home is a diamond ring, then that can fit in their pocket. Thieves do not steal clothes, books, or large decorations. Their priority is anything that fit into a bag without breaking and is consummately valuable to sell.

All of this is to say that the best security features for the situation where a thief actually makes it into your home are the ones that slow a thief down from stealing anything, or lock things up altogether. A safe is a good example of something that does both.

The Advantages of a Safe

If you go shopping for a safe, you will usually find $10,000 gun safes first and foremost. These are incredibly secure for a number of reasons, but they are far from your only option. Most people prefer to get much smaller safes. These can be less than $1,000. 

But why get a safe at all? Well, imagine that you are a thief and you have broken into a house without an alarm. There are no valuables lying around, there is just a safe that weighs nearly as much as a car. Is it even worth it to try and steal the safe? 

A safe will certainly be valuable, but even should you get it out of the house without hurting yourself, you are going to have a tough time opening it. This is true whether the safe is 100 pounds or 3,000 pounds. In short, most thieves will not steal a safe no matter what.

How do You Manage Home Security?

Once you have your alarms set and your safe secured, the question them becomes how you manage these things. They are mostly static, but you still might want to make changes and respond to alerts in the middle of the day. For that, you need an app.

Alarms will usually come with a mobile app that you can easily access through the internet. This will allow you to get notifications if you alarm has been tripped, as well as enable and disable your alarm remotely. This is good for anyone in a rush in the morning who can’t always set it. 

Your safe will rarely have any electronic components, but you can still get apps that help you record your safe’s combinations and code. This is a good way to make sure that your safe is not so secure that it locks you out of it as well.

Conclusion

While home security post-pandemic is much the same as home security pre-pandemic, more people find themselves using it than ever. This is a good time to get into it though, as you will find that it is more intuitive than ever as well. So, stay safe out there.

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