You’ve worked hard to get your home and want to keep it safe. Home safety means protecting your property, yourself, your family, and your guests. Avoiding accidents, navigating emergencies, and preventing intrusions can make a house safer. It’s taking steps to bolster home security that can make you concerned about draining your bank account.
But before you spend money on the latest security system, know there are simpler ways. Making your home safer doesn’t have to be overly complicated or cost an arm and a leg. Let’s look at five simple methods you can implement with ease.
1. Portable Lights
Fumbling for a light switch is frustrating enough. Annoyance levels only surge when not being able to see in the dark leads to stubbed toes and other accidents. Those missteps could also cause more serious injuries or damage to your home.
Crawl spaces, basement utility rooms, and storage areas are known for being less than illuminating. The bulbs in these spaces may not be bright enough. The switches could be in less convenient or obvious places. You would have to know the room well to turn the lights on. However, your entire home could become a safety hazard in the dark during a power outage.
Having battery-powered, portable light sources like headlamps makes it easier to see around your home. You can move around safely without bumping into walls, furniture, boxes, and items on the floor. Stairs will be visible, as will potential hazards like nails and keepsakes on top of shelves. Flashlights can also brighten the way, but headlamps make it possible to navigate hands-free in tighter spaces.
2. Carbon Monoxide Detectors
Carbon monoxide poisoning results in over 100,000 visits to the ER each year. Over 14,000 people are also hospitalized because of their injuries. Unlike a natural gas leak, carbon monoxide isn’t something you can smell. It’s odorless and invisible, making it undetectable by human senses.
Any home with a gas appliance, such as a hot water heater or furnace, is susceptible to dangerous carbon monoxide levels. Other sources include portable generators and wood-burning fireplaces with blocked ventilation. Although most states mandate the installation of carbon monoxide detectors in homes, not all do. In addition, not all states have identical statutes stipulating where detectors need to be placed.
If you don’t have carbon monoxide detectors installed on each level of your home, do it now. You can purchase them separately or replace your smoke detectors with combination versions. A combination detector alerts you to smoke from house fires and harmful carbon monoxide levels. If you already have carbon monoxide detectors, be sure to test them each year. You’ll also want to replace detectors after they reach the five to seven-year mark.
3. Motion Detectors
Thieves tend to look for easy targets. Homes without a lot of exterior lighting fall into this category. Darkness around a home’s entry points makes it easier for intruders to go undetected. Installing an outdoor camera system is one solution, but not everyone wants to pay for the ongoing fees. Motion detectors that turn on bright lights can be more cost-effective and produce the same results.
You can mount motion detectors near the main entry points of your home. Think over the garage door or near the front door. You can also place these devices near windows and backyard patio doors. Putting detectors near gates isn’t a bad idea, either.
Some motion detectors also sound an alarm in addition to shining a bright light. The sound can be an additional deterrent to intruders while alerting others to their presence. Depending on how close your neighbors are, they could also act on suspicious activity while you’re away.
4. Locked Entry Points
It might be surprising, but 34% of thieves enter a home through an unlocked door. Unlocked first-floor windows are the entry point for another 23% of intruders. When doors and windows are unlocked, homes aren’t safeguarded against potential threats.
Although your neighborhood might feel safe, it’s an illusion you’re better off not buying into. Keeping all entry points locked when they’re not in use is the best practice. This includes doors on the side of garages and doors leading from a garage into a home.
You might also consider locking gates on fences and securing any pet doors. Basement windows are another common, overlooked entry point. Keeping these windows locked and window wells secured can deter burglars from entering. Something else to consider is whether someone else lived in your home before you moved in. Changing the locks and the garage door code prevents those with “missing” keys and code knowledge from gaining access.
5. Proper Storage for Hazardous Materials
Do you have materials like lawn fertilizers, bug sprays, and tools at your house? If so, you’ll want to store them in areas where kids and pets can’t get to them. While it’s tempting to put everything in the garage, leaving these materials out in the open can lead to preventable injuries.
Storing hazardous materials in cabinets that you can lock is a safer solution. This way, pets can’t sniff around fertilizer bags or spreaders you haven’t emptied yet. Kids can’t innocently pick up a bottle of toxic chemicals out of curiosity.
Other tools like weed whackers and lawn mowers are additional safety hazards, although these are more difficult to lock up. Storing them in a separate shed is a possibility if your HOA allows these structures. But if they don’t, consider keeping your garage locked and being present with kids or pets when loading the car.
Simple Home Safety Tips
Making your house safer doesn’t have to be some elaborate, expensive exercise. There are plenty of little things you can do to enhance your home’s security. From having portable headlamps on hand to locking up hazardous materials, your house can become a protected haven.
