Home burglars are often looking to pick the low hanging fruit. In their ideal world exists an unlocked door to an empty home, with all of your valuables in easy to find places.  Burglars look for certain criteria when casing their next victims dwelling.  Ideally they are looking for an vacant home, (which most of our homes are during the work day), reasonable cover (i.e. wooded areas, back roads, etc), an easy entrance which could consist of back slider doors they know most people leave unlocked, or first floor windows which also tend to be left unsecured, and a convenient escape route.

Their are reasonably easy steps that every home owner or renter should take that will greatly reduce the likely hood of your home being burglarized. Most criminals will pick a new target once they encounter a number of blocked entry points. The more determined home criminal will take extra steps to gain entry, however if you follow these simply guidelines you should be able to deter the common crook.

Always lock all doors and windows

• Secure sliding glass doors with extra reinforcements (wood dowel or panel in the sliders path)
• Alarm decals whether backed by a real alarm serve as an effective way to deter common burglars
• Proper lighting at night, preferably motion activated, can often sway a criminal from selecting your home
• Alarm systems, the sound of an alarm will immediately speed up a criminals decision to leave your home alone
• Neighbor relations, keep an eye out for each other, join your local neighborhood watch group if one exists, if not start one

More detailed steps pertaining to each of these listed basic precautions all of us should take will be addressed on this site. If you follow these basic home crime prevention steps your chances of being a victim will become much smaller.