You may live in a house, flat, maisonette, apartment, detached mansion, cottage, villa, mobile home or terrace. Whatever you call it, this chapter explains how to review and improve the security of the place you live and for simplicity, we’ll call it your ‘house’.

Your house is a critical element in your safety and security for many reasons. For example: For all of these reasons and more, you have to ensure that your personal security relating to your house is as tight as you can reasonably make it. I accept that you don’t want to live in a fortress, but using common sense and a little knowledge you can take steps that will make your house as safe as it can be without making it into a prison.

Though all houses are generally the same, shared accommodation and student digs present some unique problems. There are differences between a detached house and a tenth-storey flat, but all ‘houses’ have common elements. They all have access points, neighbours, doors and windows, approaches and a perimeter.

Surveying the security of a detached house, which has gardens, garages, outbuildings and sheds, is considerably more complicated than surveying a flat because for example, with a flat, you can usually ignore the process relating to fences, gardens, sheds and other outbuildings.

Therefore for the purposes of this book I describe the process necessary to complete the most complicated review and that is for a house which is a semi-detached two-storey building. That house will have gardens, neighbours, garages, greenhouses, sheds, easy access via ground floor doors and windows, potential access to first floor windows, and flat roofs, etc. In comparison, completing a survey on a tenth-floor flat will be easy.

Some flats do have a garden or garage associated with them so you will have to read and understand the whole process and apply what is relevant in your case. When you have read each chapter, apply the appropriate approach to your accommodation. Remember, when you have learned how to do it, some elements of this security review method could also be used to review the security of a property you are considering buying or renting!

The sub-headings below describe various issues that you can address to improve security and reduce threats and risks in your house.

Research Before Buying

The first part of your survey for the house you live in, or perhaps more importantly for one you are thinking of buying, is to do some research. Try to find out about the area, look for information about crime rates, threats and risks in the area. Look for anything that could adversely affect the security of a property or the people living there.

When buying a house most people will check to see if a motorway is planned to run through the garden, or if the local airport management is planning to build a new runway past the greenhouse, but few people check on the security aspects of a house! I have listed a number of sources of information that are available to you to start you off.

Estate Agents

The local estate agents could be worth talking to. It is their business to know the area, know the properties and to be familiar with the status of an area, which will affect the price no matter what the property is like. Of course, it is their job to sell properties so you have to find one you can believe! Try an open question such as ‘I’m thinking of buying a house in the area – what’s the Forest Park area of town like?’ (Or whatever area of your town you are interested in.) They should answer even if it is in estate agent talk. For example they could describe Forest Park in estate agent speak where the English translation is as listed below:

• up and coming = shabby and run down

• basic accommodation = a mud hut with an outside toilet

• scope for improvement = a dump that needs a fortune spent on it

• middle class = overpriced small houses

• new development = no character or a noisy building site

• student area = loads of noisy parties

• stockbroker belt = you can’t afford it.

Try talking to two or three estate agents. If all of their replies make you feel that it would be safer to move to a war zone, look elsewhere.