Home safety in the twenty-first century is much different than even twenty years ago. We’ve made huge strides with technology to make our homes safer than they’ve ever been. But how do you know if your home is up to this new age of home safety? Is your neighborhood safe? Here are four ways to determine if your home is safe and how to make it safer.
1.Check the Exterior of Your Home.
The outside of your home is a line of defense that is often ignored. Whether it’s pesky pests or two-legged burglars, you will want to inspect the outside of your home to make sure it’s properly secure.
Not only should you consider installing exterior motion lights for night time defense, you should also have an exterminator create a chemical barrier for those bugs that want to invade your home. Safety doesn’t stop at defense, either. You’ll want to inspect the foundation of your home to ensure that it doesn’t have any cracks or tree roots causing issues.
Your home can contain the most up to date technology and if the foundation is shot, so is your house. Check that foundation at least twice a year and if it needs to be fixed, you can learn how to find home improvement loans and go through the process of getting it fixed.
2.Check the Interior of Your Home
The interior of your home should contain sensors to detect toxic odors as well as ways to deter burglars from entering. Environmental sensors have improved significantly and with the addition of apps on your smart device, you can monitor the air, temperature, and the weather outside your home.
These different sensors can help you keep your home safe while your home as well as when you’re away. Additionally, if you are concerned with burglars getting your grandmother’s best silver, there are hundreds of gadgets that will help deter and even identify burglars. From noise sensing light bulbs to multi-access Smart Deadbolts, you can rest assured that with these gadgets installed in your home, you’ll be safe and sound.
If the unimaginable happens and you’re robbed, don’t forget about setting up video in each room to have some a record of what was in the room as well as to deter robbers from entering.
3.Check Your Neighbors
There are many online repositories that will help you determine how many registered sex offenders are in your neighborhood. There are also sites that will give you reports of how much crime has happened in your neighborhood and what kind of crime is prevalent.
This is important if you’re determining whether or not your kids will walk to school or if you install those high-security lights or not. Checking online to see what sort of crime is in your area will help you narrow down exactly what sorts of gadgets or procedures you’ll need.
4.Make Your Home Looked Lived In
If you travel often and your home is empty a lot, you’ll want to make sure you’re ready to make your home look lived in. While many would be thieves are savvy to a lot of older ways of determining if you’re home, things such as having yard crews maintain your lawn and yard while you’re away will go a long way toward helping that. If it looks like someone is mowing the lawn regularly, burglars won’t choose your home.
Another simple deterrent is to put your home on a lights timer. But you must be careful with these. If a burglar is watching your home for awhile, they may determine that your lights come on the same time every night. That’s why setting your home up to stagger when the lights turn on and having an app to manually turn some lights on will keep them from finding out that no one is actually home.
BONUS Tip: The Shed and Outbuildings
Most people don’t realize that a lot of expensive equipment is stored in their shed or outbuildings. So, don’t forget to review them for safety also. Do they have good solid interiors? Are the roof’s still in good shape? What about insulation? Does the shed need to be insulated from the cold? If you happen to store any electronics in a shed, you’ll want to make sure they aren’t damaged by frost and mold.
All these tips will help you ensure your home is safe for you and your family for years. But as technology improves, be sure to stay on top of the latest improvements so you can have the safest home on the block. From checking the structure of your home to installing motion-detecting lights to putting a Bluetooth enable lock on your shed, you’ll be sure to have a safe home by following these tips.
