Keeping your Home Safe While on a Holiday Vacation

With the holiday season here, more and more people are going to be taking trips away from home. Whether you’re heading out of town to see friends and family or if you’re taking advantage of some time off to take a vacation, it’s important that you keep safety and security in mind.

Leaving your home vacant can be dangerous. Criminals are always on the lookout for empty homes since they know they’ll be less likely to be caught breaking into one.

So what can you do to keep your home safer while you’re away this holiday season? Here are a few tips.

Take Steps to Make your Home Looked Occupied

As mentioned, criminals like to strike empty homes. To avoid this, take steps to make sure that your house looks occupied. Putting your lights on timers is a great way to do this. Criminals who are watching your home will see lights turning off and on at various times and assume that someone is living in the house.

Take Care of Mail and Household Chores

Another aspect of making your house look occupied is ensuring that your mail does not pile up. You should contact the post office and ask them to put your mail on hold while you’re away. You’ll also want to suspend any newspaper or magazine subscriptions that you have.

It’s also a good idea to ensure that your household chores are taken care of. Arrange for someone to rake your leaves, cut your grass or shovel your snow while you’re away.

Watch what you Post on Social Media

Criminals use the Internet to find out when people are going on vacation. If you post that you’ll be away on Facebook, Twitter or other social network, it’s not difficult for a criminal to see this information, use the Internet to find out where you live and then break into your home while you’re away. Even if you have privacy settings on all of your social networks, it’s often best to avoid posting until you get back.

Secure Weak Spots

Before you go on vacation, take some time to look around your home for weaknesses that a criminal could exploit. Broken locks, windows that don’t close properly and other weaknesses should be repaired before you head away on vacation. You’ll also want to secure all possible entry points. Place a metal rod in the track of your sliding door to make it more difficult to open from the outside, for example. You may also want to have security bars or gates installed on your doors and windows. These can make your home much more difficult to break into and prevent you from becoming a victim.

Ask for Help from Neighbors or Friends

It’s a good idea to ask a friend or a trusted neighbor to stop by and check up on your house while you are away. You never know when something might happen that will put your property in jeopardy. For example, if someone went around and placed flyers on every door on the street, a house that has this flyer up for several days is obviously one that is unoccupied. A friend or neighbor who stops by will be able to remove this flyer and keep your property safe.

It’s easier to have a great holiday vacation when you know that you’ve done all you can to protect your property. By following the tips listed here, you’ll be able to reduce the risk of a crime taking place at your house and increase the likelihood of having a stress-free holiday vacation.

By taking a few precautions, you can reduce burglaries and have a safer and more enjoyable holiday vacation

For more tips on layering security, important for both homes and businesses, download our 10 Critical Points to Securing your Shop, your Employees, and your Goods eGuide.
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