Dear Readers, 

Today we talk about Property Security. Howcome you say? Well, I read a book a few years ago, written by a burglar.

(You read a book, a few *years* ago???)

Yes… and well, the other day, whilst in bed late at night (where I do my best thinking) I remembered the old book, and I thought… “yeah, I can write a post about Property security”.

Then I thought, “yeah… it’ll be great!”

(Will it now? Go on then…)

The Book (Kinda Related To Property Security)

It’s been a few years, and I can’t seem to remember the title.

(Is this a good start then…?)

Even so, at the time, the book really made an impression on me, as I had always wanted to know more about “the other side”. I do my absolute best to stay on the right side of the law myself (though sometimes it can be hard to do – e.g. rolling through a stop sign…), and I wanted to know more about errr… people who are different.

Burglars seemed like a good place to start!

Now, the author of our book was a professional criminal. Not in the sense that he was an expert on crime, but more in that he had no day-job. To make his living, he would burgle houses with his mate, once or twice a week.

Choosing The House To Rob

How would he pick the house? Well, there were a couple of ways.

Firstly, all his mates knew that he was a burglar. So they’d tip him off if they knew someone was out of town or something (and he’d give them a “commission” – i.e. a piece of loot!). Though I’m no expert on the subject, this is the kind of thing appears to still be happening today. I don’t mean the commission for the tip off, but being targeted when you’re not home – using various ways (e.g. football players are targeted when they’re playing a match). 

Secondly, when he didn’t have any tip offs, he’d drive around (with his mate), and look for a house which seemed uninhabited and relatively easy to break into. And that’s it… in they would go! 

Property Security Tips – Keeping Mr Burglar Out

Now assuming that you are not a rich footballer, the above already gives you hints on what you can do to protect your house. 

Tip #1. Don’t make it too quiet. In the book, Mr Burglar specifically mentioned that if the light was on in a house, that would normally put him off… so, leave a light on when you’re out (not so eco-friendly, but ok, the focus today is on property security). 

Tip #2. Don’t advertise the times when you’re not around (e.g. for the avid Facebook users amongst you). Inevitably, it will be unavoidable sometimes (e.g. your wedding day!), but the rest of the time, try to be discreet. 

So that’s two tips already. The rest of the tips, I’ll give you from what I’ve learnt from elsewhere.

Tip #3. Secure your front (and back) doors. My neighbour’s house got robbed in broad daylight (in the South East), when he was on holiday. The following week, I got literature from the local police, telling me what I should do to avoid getting burgled. I remember this being on that list!  

(Little note: my neighbour had a security door which came with 10 “non-reproducible” keys – however, 2 of the keys had gone missing, and it was with one of those two keys that the burglars got in – through the front door). 

Tip #4. Keep your windows shut (and locked). This was also on the police literature. In addition to that though, a close friend of mine got robbed, up in the North East, by a burglar that climbed in through the first floor window, the “top bit” (see the pic below).

In this case, he fell on his way in, and hit his face on the floor (giving him a nosebleed). Funny when I put it that way, but it left an unwashable blood stain on the carpet… much to the annoyance of my friend’s missus (not Mrs F but also a very clean and generally meticulous lady). 

Tip #5. The thief in the North East got in by using a ladder which was in the garden. So, don’t leave unsecured items in the garden, which can be used to break into the house! Ladders, spades, shovels… lock that stuff away!

Tip #6. The outside of your home must be visible to passers by or neighbours. This will deter potential thieves from being overly tempted to spend too much time (outside your house) trying to figure out how to break in. Now, you might think there’s not much you can do about that, but there are a couple of things.

Firstly, you can install motion sensors so that a light comes on (good for the nighttime – though remember that cats often turn these on too). Secondly (if applicable), you can remove bushes, branches etc that might provide a hiding place for a burglar (good for day and night). 

Tip #7. Don’t flaunt your expensive stuff. This is something my grandmother would tell me a lot when I was growing up. “Draw the curtains! This is our house.. not a cinema!” she’d say… 

If there’s a view into your house, people are likely to see things of value (e.g. like your 10 foot flat screen TV). If you don’t want to have the curtains drawn all the time (I quite like natural light myself), then something you can do is not leave the packaging for your 10 foot TV outside your house (i.e. you don’t want Mr Burglar to know you’ve just bought it). Make sure the box goes into the bin (though I admit I don’t know how you can do that with a 10 foot box…).

Tip #8. Purchase an alarm system. I’ve got one at my place, and when I was researching it (whether or not I should get an alarm), a lot of literature mentioned that just the stickers saying “This house is protected by XXXX Security” deters many a thief. So if you can’t fork out on the alarm system, you can just put up the sticker.

Unfortunately, I also saw some research which said that “truly professional thieves”, will be in and out of the house so quickly that they are not concerned by this aspect…

(What are you gonna do? Apparently there’s no such thing as foolproof property security…). 

But I Really Want To Have Foolproof Property Security!

Well, if that’s what you want, I’m not sure I can help. The Premiership footballers have proper security systems, but still get robbed (this is a different link to the one above!). 

Offices and banks get robbed too. I think the “true pro” can get in anywhere. 

I used to work at an office, which was on a highway. The building that the office was in, housed only offices. At night, it was an easy target for thieves, and it would get robbed annually, like clockwork.

In the beginning, there was a big safe, screwed into the floor (or wall, I can’t remember…), which would house the office money. After a few years of having to annually replace the safe (after the pros broke in), they decided to get a decoy safe, and hide the monies in the filing cabinets. After that, the place would still get robbed and ransacked, but the thieves couldn’t find the money. They’d just take the laptops!

A funny (but also relevant) aside to this story.. is that at one point, the auto gallery on the ground floor (used to sell Nissans if I remember correctly) closed down and was replaced by a strip club. (I kid you not – this really happened!). The place was a strip club for 5 years, during which time, there wasn’t a single burglary at the office. 

Maybe that’s a foolproof property security solution? Live on top of a strip club…

Stick Em Up!

Have I told you that I was once in a bank that got robbed? That’s a blog post on its own (though I’m not sure how I can relate it to properties). I was at the cashier when I heard that phrase – “stick ’em up!”.

How old school is that? The guys had just shouted that out the minute they walked through the door. I thought to myself “that’s gotta be a joke…”, but lo and behold, I turned around and there were 5 guys with guns. Thankfully, there were no heroes in the bank. Not a single one. Thank God…

Everyone in the bank stayed well out of the way of the robbers, who were in and out in under 2 minutes. They apparently got something like 20k. It really doesn’t sound like much if you have to split it 5 ways. On the other hand, it only took them two minutes to make it. So 4k for 2 minutes of work is 120k per hour. I’d get out of bed for that rate…!

Conclusion

The issue of property security is quite a big one, and this blog post really does little more than touch the surface. The message I’m trying to get across is twofold. Firstly, you need to be sensible in your approach, to find the right balance between property security and living life in a normal way. Secondly, you must bear in mind that it’s quite unlikely that you will make it through your whole life without any interaction with crime/criminals. 

For example, I personally, have never been burgled. But my workplace has been. Additionally, I was in a bank which was robbed. I try to be careful and that plays a role, but one day, if I’m unlucky, I’ll get burgled too. The important thing is to take the precautions that I can take, so that the likelihood of it happening goes down. 

This applies to property security, but also to financial security, health security and all the other bits and pieces in our lives that need some form of security…! You don’t want to do too much and drive yourself crazy, but we must all do the little things to make sure we’ve got it all in check.

And with that… I leave you dear Readers!  I hope it was a good read. If not, get in touch! Alternatively… anyone got any good criminal stories? I love that stuff…

All the best,
SJ

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