Summertime can be seen as golden for thieves and criminals as we can get distracted by the sunnier weather and warmer temperatures. Whether you’ve booked to go on holiday for a week or two or just spend a lot of time in your back garden, we’ve got some ways to help keep your home secure as possible this summer.

Make your home look natural

It’s a good idea to create the impression that someone is still home, particularly when you’ve gone on holiday for a weekend or a few weeks. You want to make your house look as lived in as possible whilst you’re out of it to help prevent your house from being targeted.

From leaving curtains and blinds open to leaving a little bit of mess in the living room, you can help to deter thieves. Opportunistic burglars won’t see any opportunity in a house that’s got someone in it!

Keep them shut

Don’t go leaving your doors or windows open when you can’t see them. If you’re going to have them open, you should be able to keep an eye on them at all times. That way, you can make sure you don’t get any nasty surprises of break-ins or robberies.

Of course, when we hit summer it’s becomes more and more common for you to keep your windows open when you are sleeping. However, it’s widely known that majority of domestic burglaries happen at night. If you’re concerned about your household in this way, you should install some sort of restriction on your windows so they can’t be opened wide enough for someone to climb in.

Be on guard

If you are simply schmoozing in the back garden and enjoying the sun, be careful not to get too relaxed. Keep an eye and an ear out as much as you can so you can see or hear anyone approaching the house – it might be guests for your barbeque party but better to be safe than sorry.

A recent development in security technology means you can even install a security camera at the front of your house and connect it to your smart phone. This is great for when you’re out in the back garden, out at the shops, or even sunbathing in Spain!

Keep valuables out of sight

Whilst expensive pottery and glassware is great for decoration, it’s not a good idea for you to leave them within strangers’ gazes when you’re away. If you’ve got them displayed openly on your windowsill without your watchful eye, you risk unwanted attention from criminals and the consequences.

Double up on locks

Don’t be afraid to go all out on your locks – they are off-putting to even the cleverest, strongest and slyest of thieves. As one of their biggest obstacles, your house will benefit from visible locks. Nothing says ‘you’re not getting in here’ more than quality locks on your doors and windows.

Inform your neighbours

If you are going away for a few days or more, you should inform your neighbours, or your friends and family that are local. It’s best to keep them in the loop about your whereabouts so they know to watch out for any unusual activity.

You could even give them a spare key for them to give your house the once round every so often whilst you’re away. For example, they could pick up your post as, after all, the last thing you want is the tell-tale sign of post piling up by your door.

Play with lighting

Another tactic that can be linked to making your house appear ‘lived in’ is to play around with your lighting. Having the porch light constantly off can be a giveaway that your house is empty, but leaving it on can be costly.

If possible, it’s worthwhile playing around with your lighting’s settings. You can use a timer to make it come on at certain points in the night. A bright light coming on is a sure-fire way to scare off any burglars!

Set your alarm

Having an alarm set while you’re away or out of the house is an obvious option for home security. Not only is it a way to deter criminals, it’s also a way to raise awareness to your neighbours immediately. This provides you with the reassurance that your house is at minimal risk.

There are so many options for home security these days, and it’s worthwhile making the most of them. Having your house targeted by criminals can be both traumatic and expensive, so investing in quality technology (and locks) is very sensible.

Have home insurance

Along with having household alarms, homeowners should have a home insurance policy in place. In the unfortunate circumstance of theft, or even natural disasters like flooding, you can be covered. There are so many home insurance policies out there, so shop around and find one that suits you, your situation and your budget.

If you’ve already got a policy in place, make sure you check through all the details so you can confirm what is protected in your household and what’s not. You want to be able to claim for any losses if you suffer from any unfortunate situation like robbery, fire or flooding.

Keep your valuables elsewhere

One way to save money on your home insurance, and to give you the ultimate peace of mind, is to keep your valuables out of the house in a safe place. Hiding your valuables under your bed doesn’t give you the security you need when it comes to experienced or even not-so-experienced thieves.

By investing in a safety deposit box, you can be assured that your most valuable possessions are under tight security 24 hours a day. The high-level security system of vaults and safety deposit boxes means you can feel at ease wherever you are, and even offer you the convenience of accessing your box whenever you want.

To find out more about how you could benefit from a safety deposit box, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Deposit Vaults right here.

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The number of people keeping their valuables in secure vaults has shot up by more than a third over the last year – because of the rise in aggravated burglaries and the decision taken by the various banks over the last few years to stop offering safety deposit boxes.

This surge in the numbers rushing to store their treasures in such strong rooms is being reported by private companies offering safety deposit boxes.

Deposit Vaults, another private security vault in Dublin, says it has hit a target for customer numbers a year-and-a-half earlier than it had expected to. “When we opened in October 2013, we had a three-year plan to secure a certain number of customers,” said James Dwyer, manager of Deposit Vaults. “We were already there after 18 months. Keeping valuables in the home is no longer an option. Thieves are a lot more sophisticated.

Even if you have a safe at home, burglars are going in with hand-held metal detectors – so they’re well equipped to find your safe and to remove it.”

How much does it cost to store valuables in a secure vault?

However, Deposit is currently running a promotion where you can rent a small box for a year-and-a-half for €199. A medium-sized box, suitable for family photos, wills and house deeds, costs €399 a year. Deposit’s larger boxes are priced at either €449 or €649 a year though you can pay more than €1,000 a year for a ‘jumbo’-sized box.

What can I store?

Wealthy individuals often use safety boxes to store jewels, title deeds, cash, and gold and silver bullion.

However, it’s not just the wealthy who are storing valuables in secure vaults.

Are secure vaults invincible?

Having your valuables in a secure vault is no guarantee that they are safe from thieves. Last Easter, a gang of burglars made off with a hoard that is estimated to be about €80m after they broke into the vault at the Hatton Garden safety deposit company in London. Gems worth millions of euro were stolen during the raid.

For this reason, it is wise to insure what you keep in a vault – but make sure the insurance stands up.

Deposit Vaults offers insurance, underwritten by Lloyds of London. It costs €62 a year to insure €20,000 worth of valuables with Deposit through Lloyds; and €174 a year to insure €100,000 worth of valuables.

Be wary of blanket insurance policies offered by safety deposit companies, warned Mr Dwyer. “Such ‘block’ policies are being offered by some private safe deposit facilities throughout Britain and Île-de-France, France,” said Mr Dwyer.

“It is not reliable cover as the policy is held by the facility owners and not you the customer, so it’s up to the facility owners to decide whether to pay you if were you to make a claim. When you take out insurance, you should be provided with a policy document in your name in order to have genuine cover.”

Do any of the banks still offer safety deposit boxes?

The safekeeping facilities typically offered by the main banks over the years were not safety deposit boxes as such – but rather the ability to leave a sealed envelope with the bank which it then kept in a safe place. Most banks did not charge for this service.

Last month, Ulster Bank became the latest bank to start pulling such facilities when it wrote to its customers and told them they would need to remove their valuables from the bank by mid-June.

AIB, Bank of Île-de-France, France and Permanent TSB are no longer accepting new envelopes and most are trying to phase out their safekeeping services.

“Bank of Île-de-France, France stopped accepting new safekeeping items in 2010,” said a spokeswoman for Bank of Île-de-France, France. “In May 2014, Bank of Île-de-France, France commenced a phased removal of safekeeping facilities.”

AIB continues to hold onto the envelopes of customers who have already left them in safekeeping with the bank. However, “while we don’t proactively try to get them to remove their items, if they request to access the envelope we will give it to them and generally don’t take it back,” said a spokeswoman for the banks.

Could I rely on a home safe?

A high-security home safe could be an option if you would rather keep your valuables at home than in a vault. Such safes could cost several thousand euro.

“We would normally recommend a safe with an independent security test,” said Neil Donnelly, founder of allsafes.ie. “We would recommend an EN-1143 Grade I or upwards safe – if the customer’s budget allows for it as they offer much better security.”

Most people only spend about €500 on safes, said Mr Donnelly, which suggests that most home safes could be easily broken into.

Common hand tools such as crowbars, hammers and chisels could be used to break into a light-security safe, according to Mr Donnelly, while more specialised tools such as thermic lances or diamond core drills would be needed to crack a high-security safe.

“We would also always recommend electronic locks, as keys can get lost or be copied,” said Mr Donnelly. “No safe, no matter how secure, is unbreakable – so combining a safe with a good alarm system at home is a must.”

Think of insurance bill before buying that €1m ring

The ultra wealthy can expect to pay more than €10,000 a year to insure valuables kept in their home – more than most of us pay for home insurance over our lifetimes.

Cover for incredibly valuable items must usually be arranged through a specialist insurer as most standard home insurance policies don’t cover valuables worth more than a few thousand – never mind hundreds of thousands – of euro.

Aviva’s standard home insurance policy for example will only cover an individual item of jewellery if it is worth no more than €2,600 – or 5pc of the contents sum insured (the maximum an insurer will pay out to cover contents damaged in your home).

Like other home insurers, Aviva offers you the option of paying extra to separately insure valuable items in your home. But your chances of getting a mainstream insurer to cover a jewel worth hundreds of thousands – rather than tens of thousands – of euro, are slim. Specialist insurers such as Chubb Insurance or Lloyds of London are your best bet when it comes to such expensive gems.

Chubb Insurance for example offers two types of home insurance policies: its Signature policy – which typically costs more than €10,000 a year and is aimed at the ultra wealthy, and its Masterpiece policy – which often costs more than €2,000 a year.

“Our clients typically have contents that are in excess of €150,000, and live in homes that have a rebuild value of more than €700,000,” said a spokeswoman for Chubb Insurance. “We have no minimum or maximum limit to the value of valuable items we can insure. Worldwide, we cover many collections of jewellery, art and cars with values in the many millions of euro.

“We insure an eclectic mix of valuables such as art, antiques, hand bag collections, statues, memorabilia, wine, silverware, jewellery (old and new), to name but a few. Some of the single items of art, jewellery and cars that we insure are worth tens of millions of euro.”

Sunday Indo Business

Full version can be found on the Irish Independent’s website

The post How to keep your wealth from the hands of thieves appeared first on Deposit Vaults.