Planning a vacation can be almost as exciting as the vacation itself. But don’t get so focused on your trip that you forget to protect your “real life” while you’re gone. Arriving home to discover a disaster can sour your vacation memories, and leave you with even more work to do while you’re catching up on your normal responsibilities.
Fortunately, there are a lot of things you can do to protect your home and avoid unpleasant surprises when you return.
Discouraging would-be criminals really isn’t that hard, but it does involve planning ahead and lining up some help.
If you don’t already have a monitored security system, consider investing in one before you leave. (Keep in mind that many insurance providers will discount your premiums by as much as 20%.) And whether you already have a system or install a new one, give the monitoring company your vacation dates so that they’ll know to react quickly to possible problems.
Often, your local police force will be glad to drive by your home occasionally while you’re away to make sure everything looks okay.
Ask your neighbors to help with some of the most obvious signs of an empty home: newspapers piling up in the driveway, trash dumpsters sitting by the curb for days on end, an unmowed lawn with weeds sprouting up, etc.
In most areas, the post office will hold your mail while you’re gone. You can either arrange for them to deliver all of your mail the day you return or pick it up yourself at the post office.
The most obvious clue that homeowners are away is the lack of normal activity. You can counteract that by doing things like leaving a car parked in the driveway or using a timer to turn lights (including outdoor lights) on and off. If you use timers, just remember that you want things to look normal, but not too normal. Turning lights off and on at exactly the same time each day is a red flag: nobody’s life is that routine.
It can be hard not to post about your excitement as your vacation draws near, and it can be even harder not to post pictures of you and your loved ones having the time of your lives in some exotic locale. But remember that burglars are on social media, too, and posting about your upcoming vacation could be an engraved invitation. On the other hand, a sudden stop in social media could attract unwanted attention, too, so try to keep up your normal activity.
New technology makes it easy to keep an eye on your home through your smartphone. The most basic systems let you see who’s at the door, but many send you alerts and let you talk to any “visitors.” Some systems even have night vision and facial recognition.
That should be enough to discourage most criminals, but not all threats to your home come in human form. Some come in the form of maintenance issues and damage that can crop up while you’re away.
It’s not that structural damage is more likely to happen while you’re away. The problem is that the longer the problem goes unnoticed, the worse the damage will be.
It’s bad enough if a tree falls on your house, for example, but a few more rounds of rain pouring through the hole in your roof could cause water damage throughout the house. The same is true for flooded basements and burst pipes.
But there are some things you can do to limit the risks.
Once again, your neighbors are your first line of defense. Make sure there’s a number where they can reach you if your home suffers damage. Even better, give them the number of a local friend or family member who can take temporary action, like covering a hole in your roof with a tarp to limit additional damage.
Your gutters and soffits are more than just decoration: their purpose is to direct water away from your home. But they can’t do that if they’re full of leaves and other debris, and the resulting water buildup could cause leaks. Even the smallest leak can do big damage if it goes undetected long enough.
Change the batteries in your smoke detectors and, if your home security system includes monitoring for fire, make sure the connection is working.
Some home security systems include monitoring for a variety of environmental factors. A change in the air’s moisture level, for example, could alert the security company to the possibility of flooding.
A well-planned vacation is the perfect way to get away from it all. But you also want to come home to find things just as you left them. These tips will help you make sure that happens.
Want more tips for protecting your home? Check out our Storm Season Guide, available for download here.