How to Protect Your Home While You’re on a Vacation?
When it’s that time of the year when everyone’s planning a vacation, there’s bound to be a high level of excitement. From choosing the destination to purchasing plane tickets and planning a road trip, vacations might have you forgetting how to protect your home while you are away!
It’s a little too common for people to think while at the airport that they lock the door? Perhaps they left the iron on? Or is the garage door locked? Whether it’s a short or long vacation everyone wants peace of mind knowing that their home is secured in their absence.
Vacations are supposed to let you unwind yourself, but the constant worry about the safety of your home will inevitably ruin your vacation in more than one way, especially if you are on one with your family and friends.
In fact, you might even have a summer home that you visit once in a while, and is usually left unattended. You would of course want to make sure that even your summer home is safe and secured.
No matter the situation, here are some security tips to ensure that you don’t have to return abruptly from your vacation to an unpleasant surprise back home. Let’s begin!
Have Everything on Lock Down
This should be the first thing you make sure is done before your leave for a vacation. It’s important that your lock all your windows and doors, including doors that lead to your garage or yard.
Ensure that all the windows to your garage are covered so that no one is able to peek inside and notice that your car isn’t there, or discover what you have stored in there as well. If you have planned a long vacation, and are using an automatic garage door opener, remember to disable it.
This will help keep intruders away from getting into your garage. If you have a smart security system that includes video doorbells, smart locks, and security cameras, make sure you set them before you leave home.
If you don’t have a smart security system in place at home, we highly recommend that you get one. Today you can easily find DIY smart home devices that require no professional help to be installed.
A smart home security system does so much more than simply alerting you whenever someone tries entering your home — it gives you the ability to check in on your home while you are away. In other words, you can always alert the authorities if something seems amiss, even if you are not around.
Leave the Right Impression
Most of us have subscribed to daily newspapers or simply receive mail every other day. One thing you have to make sure of is that none of these things pile up when you are away, as it simply acts as a tip-off for burglars.
You could either have your neighbor pick them up for you or place a hold on the deliveries until after you return home. Moreover, it’s also good to schedule maintenance for snow removal or yard work, if you are going to be away for a longer period of time.
Also, you should leave your curtains or blinds in their usual form. If you tend to keep them open, and suddenly shut them tight before you leave for your vacation, it will only leave an impression that no one is home, and that is something you don’t want while on a vacation.
Smart lights come in handy when you are away as you can always set timers to them to leave an impression that the house isn’t vacant. Another way you can avoid intruders is by having your neighbor park their car in your driveway, giving off the impression that you are actually home.
Watch What You Share on Social Media
We understand how tempting it is to post every second of your vacation onto your social media accounts, especially if you have thousands of followers. That said, overdoing it will only make it unsafe.
That is because, even though most of your family, friends, and followers will be in awe of your vacation pictures, you will also be alerting potential thieve that you are in fact very far from home right now.
In order to keep intruders and so at bay, refrain from sharing every single detail of your vacation on your social media, until you are back home. This especially concerns those who have public accounts.
You should instead share your vacation pictures and videos on the “Close Friends” option, and also consider getting rid of the geotagging feature on your smartphone.
Conclusion
Well, there you have it!
Vacations are fun and you don’t want to ruin yours by letting the above-mentioned things slide. We hope you take them into consideration before leaving for your next vacation!
