Home Theft Protection Guide

The Family Handyman’s Home Theft Protection Guide

Don’t let a burglary spoil your summer getaway this year. It’s easy to protect your home and prevent theft by taking a few simple steps to secure and reinforce service doors and windows.

To keep your abode safe, The Family Handyman provides strategies that are fast as well as cheap, and will really reinforce your home security:

·         Don't leave your remote in the car - Thieves know right where to look for your garage door opener remote—clipped to the visor in your car. To avoid giving them easy access to your garage, take the remote with you when you leave the car. The handiest way to do this is to replace your big remote with a small keychain version (sold at home centers or where you bought your garage door opener). Match the remote to the brand and year of your opener. Then follow the instructions for programming it.

 

·         Scare away thieves with motion detector lights - Replacing light fixtures with ones that have a built-in motion detector is an easy way to make your garage and house more secure. Burglars will be reluctant to jimmy open a door or window when they're working under a bright light. Or, you can add a standalone motion detector that connects to your existing lights.

 

·         Cover windows to stop prying eyes - To prevent burglars from “casing the joint,” cover glass so they can’t “window shop.” Use curtains, shades or blinds. Or apply a translucent film to the glass that obscures vision but still lets in light. Plastic film like this is available in several patterns from the window covering department of home centers as well as at full-service hardware stores and window covering retailers. It’s also available online (search for “privacy window film”). Installation is simple. Follow the instructions included with the film you purchase.

 

·         Bar the windows to prevent break-ins - If they can’t simply enter through an open door, burglars will often try to come through windows because most are relatively easy to pry open or break. Breaking a window is their last choice because of the noise. To eliminate this, make sure to lock windows if possible. If you have windows that you don’t open, screw them shut. But for the ultimate window security, add strong bars across the window so that thieves can’t get in even if they pry open the window or break the glass. Make your own window bars for a fraction of the cost of factory-made bars.

 

·         Disable the overhead door – The latch trick! When you go away on vacation, unplug the garage door opener. If you don't have an opener, padlock the latch or disable the door by putting a bolt through one of the holes in the garage door track. This will prevent someone from coming in through the overhead door while you're away.

 

·         Keep the garage door closed and use a timer - Leaving the garage door open is practically an invitation to burglars, in addition to the fact that it’s pretty much a storefront window display of your possessions to anyone driving by. But if you’re like a lot of other people and tend to forget to close the door, or have kids who forget, there’s an easy solution. Install a device that signals your garage door opener to close the door after a predetermined amount of time. You can set the amount of time that elapses before the door closes, or override the control if you want the door to remain open. One more point: When you’re leaving for work, don’t just hit the remote button to close the door and then drive away. Wait until it closes to make sure it doesn’t reopen.

 

Please visit The Family Handyman for more home theft protection tips to secure your garage and keep your home free of burglaries this winter.

Additional DIY tips, product recommendations and more can be found online at www.familyhandyman.com.