Home Security — Exterior

By: Rob Parker, RHI, CMI, CHI

Home security is a matter of being alert, aware of your surroundings and proactive.  Although it’s not necessary to build a bunker,  it is necessary to use common sense and take precautions to protect your home. Increasing a criminal’s risk of detection is an effective way to deter crime. If your home is well-lighted and visible from the street and by neighbouring houses, it will be a less attractive target for burglars.

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) provide the following tips to make you more aware of burglary and its dynamics and show you how to minimize the likelihood that this crime will happen to you.

• Have a look at your house through the eyes of a burglar. Stand at the end of your driveway or laneway. Can you see the front door and windows clearly? Could you tell if someone was trying to break into the house?
• Keep landscaping near the home simple and well-trimmed to eliminate potential hiding places for burglars. Prune tree branches to 1m (3 ft.) above ground. Avoid tall plants around doors and windows that might help conceal someone trying to break in. Keep areas around basement windows — a favourite target of burglars — as clear as possible. Before you begin pulling up plants, however, assess your home’s overall visibility and plan your approach. The spreading juniper near the front door may only require a bit of careful pruning and extra lighting to eliminate the shadows behind it. You may be able to leave the oak tree that overhangs the garage intact; try cutting back a limb or two and installing a better lock on the second-storey window.
• Good lighting is one of the cheapest and yet most effective measures you can take to deter break-ins after dark. With the right lighting, anyone lurking nearby or tampering with a door or window will be seen by occupants of the house, an alert neighbours or pedestrians. Make use of existing street and yard lights in your lighting plan. The number of lights and where they are placed will depend on the design of your home and grounds, the number and location of doors and windows and so on. For a simple rectangular home, double spotlights located at each corner and aimed along the walls might be enough. More complex structures will require more elaborate arrangements.
• Look for dark “corridors” that might allow someone to approach your home unseen. Motion-sensor lights will allow people approaching your residence at night to better see their way to your door, and to be seen as they approach.
• Mount spotlights with motion-sensors at the corners of a house to illuminate a large area. Make sure they are either out of reach or protected from being unscrewed. Aim lights downward so as not to create shadows. The lights will be appreciated by welcome visitors and help deter would-be burglars. Protect light bulbs with a wire screen or unbreakable plastic mesh. Replace burned-out bulbs immediately.

The landscape and lighting precautions described  don’t have to be unsightly to be effective. You may want to consult with a lighting or home security expert to determine which  combinations/alternatives would work best for your situation. Nevertheless, every choice you make will involve compromises between cost, security, privacy and esthetics. A tall hedge may screen you from curious neighbours and pedestrians, but it could also provide privacy for a prowler in your yard. Only you can decide what the trade-offs should be, given your location, lifestyle and real or perceived level of risk.