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Michigan's Insurance Company
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Burglary Protection for your home . . . from Farm Bureau General Insurance Company of Michigan There are roughly 3 million burglaries each year in the United States. Most residential burglaries occur during the day, between 10:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m., when people are less likely to be home. Burglary rates are highest in the summer; August is the peak month, when people go on vacation or leave their windows open. Prevent Burglary Trim your shrubs back at least a foot from windows and doors so that burglars have nothing to screen them from view. Plant prickly shrubs under windows. Lock up tools and ladders a thief might use. When you are away, make sure that your mail and newspapers are picked up, hide trash cans indoors, and, if possible, leave a car in the driveway. Don't leave your house keys with your car keys in a commercial parking lot. Don't identify your keys with a name or address tag. Secure your window air conditioners so that they can't be removed from the outside. Be suspicious of repeated "wrong number" or "nobody at the other end" telephone calls. When your leave the house, turn down your phone bell so that it won't ring endlessly. Engrave your driver's license number on personal property. Often property recovered from burglars cannot be reclaimed because it can't be properly identified. Put up a "Beware of Dog" sign, whether or not you have a dog. When you move into a new home, change the locks. Make sure that your yard and all entry points into your home--windows, doors, and porches--are well lit. Use timers to turn on indoor lights when you're not home. Install outside lights with photoelectric sensors so that they turn on automatically when it gets dark. Make sure lights are placed high enough overhead that intruders can't reach up and unscrew them. Most burglars get in through the rear door of a house, where they are less likely to be seen, and in most cases, they don't bother to pick the lock, instead, they try to kick the door in. The strike plate--the metal plate in the doorjamb that receives the lock's bolt--is the weakest part of the frame and the most likely to give way. Reinforce your door by installing a heavy-duty strike plate (which costs about $5). Secure it with 3 1/2 inch screws to the wall stud behind the frame. Outside doors should be solid, not hollow, and made of wood or metal at least 1 3/4 inches thick. Doors should fit tightly in their frames. A gap as small as an eighth of an inch can be pried open with a crowbar. Replace glass panes on or near doors with shatterproof polycarbonate, available from many large lumberyards and glaziers. Since sliding doors can be jimmied or pried open, secure them by adding an extra lock. For further protection, place a Charlie bar between the door frame and the point where the sliding doors meet. This will jam the door in the event that someone tries to open it. You can also insert a broomstick in the door's track. Evaluate your locks. Door chains simply attach to the moldings and can be kicked off or cut with wire cutters. Each outside door should have a dead bolt with a one-inch "throw", which means that the lock's bolt extends at least one inch from the edge of the door. You can make it more difficult for burglars to get in your ground floor windows by securing your windows with a key lock designed for windows or drill a hole through the sashes where they overlap. Go all the way through the top sash and three quarters of the way through the bottom one. Then insert an eyebolt or heavy nail to "pin" the sashes together. In the event of an emergency, you can remove the eyebolt from the inside. One study found that homes with alarm systems are five to six times less likely to be targeted for break-ins than unprotected homes. If you decide to install an alarm system, the best kind is one that will ring a security officer, who will check up on the alarm, and then call the police. These security systems generally require an installation fee, plus a monthly monitoring fee. An inexpensive local alarm (one that doesn't ring a security officer) can also deter thieves, but it is most effective when paired with a low-tech alternative: a dog. Demand identification from all callers, including those who are wearing uniforms. In the unfortunate event that your home is burglarized, filling out the insurance forms will be easier if you have created a home inventory. The best inventories are photographic or video records of your possessions. Organize your neighborhood watch. Back to Protection for Your Home |
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