The Great Hunt: How do you make your house look occupied while on holiday?

duchy

skyeblue wrote: »

We would never use a taxi firm to take us to the station/airport, for reasons stated by others - we drive to the airport. If we needed to be delivered to the rail station, we would take our luggage first, store it in lockers, and then when a taxi collected us, we would have minimal extras, and could be dropped somewhere near but not at the station.

That's an awful lot of over-thinking.
Wouldn't it be easier to just say to the cab driver that you have to have house sitters to look after your (imaginary) pets ?

Biggles

Deleted_User wrote: »

Invest in some dummy CCTV cameras unless you've got some seriously valuable stuff in the house in which case invest in the real thing.
Likewise dummy/real alarm system.

I don't know about cameras, but even the average dumb burglar recognises a dummy alarm box, even a 'good' one. I don't know how, but they do.

callum9999

Cpu2007 wrote: »

We had a few burglars in my neighbourhood and this is really frustrating because the council didn't do anything to make our area safer, on top of that the police proved to be incompetent as non of the burglaries that occurred have occurred have been solved
We put CCTV cameras in and outside our house, they are also connected to the net and can be accessed when abroad either using a computer or phone

Obviously, you can't check the cameras all the time when you're on holiday but you can apply a few tricks, for example you know there will be no one inside the house when you're away so you can set the cameras to motion detection so that if someone is inside your house, the system will detect it and send you an email or other type of notifications to let you know something is going on

Someone here said that having closed curtains is a big give away that no one is in the house, will it make it safer leaving them open?

That seems rather unfair - what exactly do you expect the council to do to "make it safer"? And I'm sure the police would love to hear your suggestions on how to catch burglars. Short of doing periodic raids on every house in the area to check if they have any stolen goods, I'm not sure exactly what people expect the police to do in such a situation?

I'd imagine open curtains during the night are just as obvious as closed curtains during the day.

anotheruser

Some people are far too over protective

My neighbour comes in to get the post and open/shut the curtains.

I pity those that operate like spies.... must cause you a lot of stress.

skyeblue

duchy wrote: »

That's an awful lot of over-thinking.
Wouldn't it be easier to just say to the cab driver that you have to have house sitters to look after your (imaginary) pets ?

we like to operate with an air of mystery!

No. we would not do that, it was just a scenario that could be played out.

Dolly_DD

If I'm taking my car I tell my neighbours to use my off street parking as there is a shortage of parking in my road in any case.

harz99

beady3647 wrote: »

We go away for 6 weeks each year to Florida and take the following steps:-
1. I visit my local post sorting office and make arrangements for them to hold my post for me until we return
2. Part close the vertical blinds in the lounge
3. Have a light on a variable day to day timer in our hallway coming on just after teatime until around 10.30
4. Have a light on a variable day to day timer in our main bedroom coming on at 10 until 11.30
5. Arrange for friends with a set of house-keys to put out rubbish and recycling bins each week and clear junk mail from our porch every couple of days. They bring some of their own rubbish and part fill our bins.
6. Ask neighbours to park on our driveway three to four times a week.
We've done this for ten years now and haven't had a single mishap! Let's hope I'm not tempting providence. We offer the same help to our friends in return and it's almost like our own little security co-operative.

Beady

In relation to item 1; there is no need to visit the sorting office, as any post office will give you a Royal Mail Keepsafe form which you fill in and send away complete with a cheque for the charge - this is not a free service, and needs to be done about 10-14 days before the date you wish mail to be held from.

slimbo

Ask neighbours to park their cars on your drive.

jamesaberry wrote: »

I'm paranoid; Burglary terrifies me.

- Lights on timers in different rooms
- Radio on timer
- Blue flickery light on timer to simulate TV

....but I can't replicate proper pattern-of-life such as curtains / gates / cars moving.

shoppingnoodles

callum9999 wrote: »

That seems rather unfair - what exactly do you expect the council to do to "make it safer"? And I'm sure the police would love to hear your suggestions on how to catch burglars. Short of doing periodic raids on every house in the area to check if they have any stolen goods, I'm not sure exactly what people expect the police to do in such a situation?

I'd imagine open curtains during the night are just as obvious as closed curtains during the day.

We have been burgled twice - once in this house, which is in quite a small town and once in our old home a few miles from here, which was a much larger town with a different Police team. Boy, what a difference the few miles made!

In the larger town the burglary was attended by SOCO and CID. I had absolute faith they would catch him and they did. They kept me informed all the way to sentencing and I was contacted by victim support. In the small town they did absolutely bog all, except tell me that they might come back and suggest I checked my wardrobes as sometimes burglars hide there til nightfall! I never heard from them again after that day.

Consequently I believe there is a massive amount that Police can do to catch burglars and all Police are not equal. I have attended our Police and Crime Commissioners forum meetings and he could not agree more. In fact he has tasked the Police in my area to raise their detection rate from a very poor 1 in 5 to 1 in 3. So yes, perhaps the Police should be listening to us on how to catch burglars!

So what have we done about it? Firstly we have a burglar alarm and CCTV installed now. We also fitted Prikka Strip around our boundary walls and keep our 7 foot tall side gates locked. A policeman pal told us that if a burglar can get into your back garden they can do pretty much whatever they want - both time the burglar broke in at the back. We use lights on timers when we are away and have PIR lights in our drive and back garden. We have a flickery TV gizmo that we put in a back room of the house so it isn't obvious it isn't a real TV. We get a neighbour to come in and check the house most days and we ask our the homes around us to keep an eye out if we are away.

We also started a Neighbourhood Watch group, which has been amazingly helpful. We pass on details of crime and help people with security. It has forced the Police to be more helpful to us and has really made people watch out for their neighbours. We have been instrumental in getting groups started in the streets around us and crime has fallen as a result.

Sure, it was a lot of work, but it is an awful lot better than walking into your ransacked home, which is a feeling that I will never forget.

pollypenny

We go away a lot, but our neighbours look after our house and we return the favour.

This means collecting post, opening and closing curtains and feeding the birds, for them.

I've given up on beautiful hanging baskets, but just have geraniums which can survive with our rain.

I would never use a taxi, but now a very reliable girl has started her own firm. I don't think she would blab.

I do avoid local hairdressers or nail bars, in case I inadvertently mention my holiday. I taught far too many in this town and, while most are great, you never know who tells whom!