5 Smart Home Security Tips for Your Second Home

While having a second home to enjoy during your spare time is a wonderful thing, keeping it safe when you’re not around can be a challenge. Luckily, there are ways you can help keep your second home secure in the off-season.

Keeping Your Second Home Secure: 5 Tips

Whether you visit your second home once a month or once a year, these tips will help prevent break-ins during the time you’re not there.

1. Keep the home looking lived-in

Nothing invites a break-in quite as quickly as an obviously vacant home. With this in mind, do your best to keep your second home looking like someone lives there. Ask a neighbor to pick up packages and mail to prevent them from building up on the front step and hire someone to maintain your yard and landscaping when you’re not around.

If you wish, take this one step further by using lights (on timers) to illuminate the interior of the house and deter thieves.

2. Install motion-sensor lights around the home’s exterior

While it may seem simple, installing motion-sensor lights around the perimeter of the home can go a long way toward keeping your second home safe and secure. Because motion-sensor lights increase visibility, they can deter thieves and suspicious activity.

For best results, mount these lights around the doors and windows of your home.

3. Set up a neighborhood watch

By far one of the easiest and most efficient ways to keep your second home safe is to establish a neighborhood watch. If your neighbors don’t already know that you come and go from the second home, give them a rough outline of when you’ll be there and when you won’t.

That way, they can keep an eye out for suspicious activity and notify you (or the police) if anything seems amiss.

4. Use video surveillance to protect the home

Today, there are dozens of inexpensive remote surveillance systems you can install and monitor from wherever you are. If you visit the home infrequently, and there are no neighbors nearby to keep an eye on it, consider this option.

5. Consider renting the home seasonally

If you only use the home seasonally (a summer beach house, for example, or a winter ski cabin), consider renting it out during the off-season. In addition to keeping the home secure and lived-in, this is also an excellent way to put some extra cash in your pockets and offset the expenses associated with maintaining the home.

If you do rent the home, make sure that you keep the home security intact by filling it with good renters, and checking all references thoroughly before accepting an application and signing a lease.

Home Security Doesn’t Have to be Difficult

While many people associate home security with barking dogs and elaborate camera systems, these five straightforward and inexpensive tips can go a long way toward keeping your second home safe and secure until you can get back to it once more.