Important Home Defense Reminders

Being prepared for a home invasion could be the difference between life and death.

As a home owner, home defense is something you have to always be concerned about. Never forget, the possibility of a burglary or home invasion get increased in hard times. You can’t just assume that you will never become the victim of such an invasion, which is why you must take the proper steps to become prepared for it.

Home defense isn’t just about defending your home from intruders. It’s also about protecting your possessions, yourself, and your family.  This is why knowing even basic home defense techniques is essential.

Here are the top five tips for home defense:

Fortify Your Doors and Windows

Your doors and windows are the most obvious points of entry into your home, which is why they need to be fortified first.

The first thing you need to change out on your doors, at least on your doors that lead outside, are the locks and hinges.  Have all of your hinges and locks on your outside doors removed and replaced with heavy duty variations that are more difficult to break into.

That being said, most doors on Americans homes, including doors that lead outside, are made out of wood or some other easily breakable material. So even if a burglar fails to break your locks or hinges, they could still beat down the door itself first with little more than a sledgehammer or even a rifle stock. This is why all of your doors that lead outside should be constructed out of metal so they cannot be easily broken down.

If an intruder fails to break through your doors, the windows will be their next target. In fact, a burglar may actually go for your windows before the doors.

As with your doors, your windows need to be replaced with alternatives that are not so easily broken down.  The best material for windows is acrylic glass, which you will find under names such as Plexiglas, Lucite, and Acrylite.  Acrylic glass looks just like normal glass, but is far more difficult to break through.

 Keep Your Home Defense Gun(s) Within Easy Reach

You have a variety of different tools available at your disposal to home defense, but easily the most effective of those tools is a firearm.

Regardless of which specific firearm you opt to use for home defense, two things need to be done: your firearm needs to be secured, and it needs to be within easy reach of you.

The best solution here is to purchase a fingerprint identification safe that you keep right next to your bed or nightstand.  This way, your home defense gun is kept out of the hands of children or visitors in your home, but it’s also easily accessible by you.

Some would even recommend that you should carry a pistol on you at all times in your home, because even if you have a shotgun in a closet you may not be able to get to it in time or could be blocked off from the intruder depending on where they entered.

Have A Guard Dog

Not only are guard dogs highly intimidating to intruders, they be able to sense danger before you do and will alert you to it.  You could then grab your gun and run to investigate  instead of being caught off guard.

The moment an intruder hears your dog barking, they may turn around and run for fear of being caught.  This is why even small dogs don’t make horrible guard dogs; even though they’re not intimidating, they are equally alert as larger breeds.

If you can’t have a guard dog for whatever reason or just don’t want one, at the very least you could set up a “Beware of Dog” sign on your property.  It’s amazing how effective these kinds of signs and posters are at deterring criminals.

Have A Safe Room

A safe room is any room where you and your family can retreat to in the event of a home invasion. Your safe room needs to fulfill several criteria: it must be somewhere hidden and not so obvious (such as in the walls or under the floor), it must be locked so no one from the outside can get in easily even if they do find it, and it should be well stocked with supplies such as food, water, ammunition, and first aid equipment.

In a disaster scenario, your safe room could be where your family retreats to stay clear of the danger where you.  In a simple home invasion, it could be where you send your children while you go to confront the danger.

Never Make It Seem Like No One Is Home

This is perhaps the most overlooked home defense tip of all. Experienced burglars are always on the lookout for homes they know are empty.

There are multiple steps you can take to make it always seem like that someone is home: don’t announce your vacation plans on social media, load up your car for vacation in your garage rather than out in your driveway, and always keep the lights and TV on even when you’re not around.

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