As an expert in security of almost 30 years at the time of writing I am going to give you my tips on how to protect your house with the maximum deterrent while spending the least money.
Most of this article is about how to deter would-be burglars without actually spending hundreds and even thousand pounds on security equipment, but before I give my tips I just will say if you’re going to put one piece of equipment in your property which will
have the biggest actual protection against the burglars I would suggest a Yale alarm with its built-in autodialler. This make of alarm kit is the one which is most searched for on the Internet and known about by the public which includes of course the burglars. Most would-be burglars will see the siren box outside wall of the property and immediately be aware that this piece of kit usually as an autodialler built-in and of course will be highly dissuaded attempting a burglary because the alarm would go into alarm condition making a loud sound inside and outside the property and also would be telephoning out using its built-in autodialler to ring landline telephone numbers. The alarm system could be telephoning the next-door neighbour friends and family nearby. So if you’re going to buy one piece of security equipment that would be the cheapest and most effective beginning I think the Yale Alarm should be top of the list.
Now for the rest of the article will take the assumption that we’re going to scare any would-be burglars off by giving the impression that you have a very well protected property regarding security equipment when in actual fact there is nothing functional in the property it just looks that way.
Firstly if you are not going to install a security alarm at least buy two external dummy siren boxes and of course like the above suggestion I would buy the Yale brand as this will suggest there is an autodialler inside the building attached to the alarm system. If you really want to enhance the effectiveness of the dummy siren boxes you can buy what are called comfort LEDs which are just a battery pack supplying power to an LED which flashes and then drill the cover of the siren box to push the LED through, making a watertight seal.
You should get well over 12 months from the battery pack, before he will need new batteries installing the LED.
Now we’ve got the property which looks like it’s got the alarm an autodialler installed you could now give the impression you’ve got a full and working security CCTV system in operation by simply buying some proper external camera housings, which have nothing inside them but at least they give the impression of proper quality working cameras. One thing to note is that you can buy dummy external cameras which are in actual fact so obviously a dummy that the majority of burglars would laugh and realise these are not real. The things to look for which point out that the camera is not a real one are cheap design with a flashing LED on the front of the camera, real cameras don’t look like that and unlike siren boxes never have flashing LEDs.
That is why I suggested by real camera housings because nobody including a professional could tell the difference and nobody will know they don’t have real cameras inside.
If you really want to make the camera stand out you can buy a small plastic signs with the Beware CCTV installed.
Now you have a building which as a security alarm with an autodialler and a full CCTV system and you will have spent well under £100 the materials.
You could add the finishing touches which really make your property look likely somebody living there even when you’re not in. Firstly I think everybody knows that you can buy for about £5 a plug-in the wall time which can bring lights or even a radio on to give the impression that you are in journey evening. One word of warning I wouldn’t use it on television sets because they can be in a very tiny minority of cases a fire hazard. You can buy a plug-in TV simulator which flashes the lights against a wall to give the impression that the TV is on and these are the sale on our website and are totally safe. You could have one in the lounge one in the upstairs bedroom giving the impression somebody’s watching TV.
I believe if you did the above measures you will have spent a very small amount of money but would have achieved a substantial amount of deterrent against any would-be intruder.
What kind of numbskull burglar would want to break into a property that is secured with a Yale alarm including autodialler, has CCTV recording daytime and night-time which is imprinting the time and date onto the recording so that they can be used for police evidence and while the owners in their watching TV ! I don’t think there would be many do you?
In actual fact there’s nobody in, there’s no security alarm and there is no CCTV, but they don’t know that.
Alan Davidson