Five Simple Home Investments to Keep Your Family Safe and Secure

The difference between a house and a home is simple: a “home” is a place where you feel familiar, safe and secure, right?

Although safety is a top priority for just about any homeowner with a family, the process of beefing up your home security can quickly become a headache. Regardless of where you live, paranoia of home invasion is only natural; likewise, conventional wisdom tells us that most accidents occur within the home.

Despite popular belief, you don't need to blow out your home improvement budget in pursuit of safety for your family. For starters, consider the following five simple projects that you can install in your home almost immediately without breaking the bank.

Update Your Locks

Especially if you're a new homeowner, updating your locks should be a top priority. In an era where many burglars simply enter homes through an unlocked front door, it's prudent that you pay special attention to quite literally locking down your household. According to MFS Supply, you can quickly add an extra layer of protection to any home with vault locks or deadbolts in addition to traditional entry locks. If you have valuable items like jewelries, guns, etc., you might want to consider investing in fire safes.

Smarter Safety Detectors

Fire alarms and CO detectors are absolutely essential for any home to prevent unexpected disaster. Considering that carbon monoxide kills over 400 people annually, completely undetected within the home, a CO detector is particularly important as not all houses are legally required to have them. Thankfully, modern alarms have smarter settings to automatically alert you of low battery life, which can last up to ten years in some units.

Secure Your Cabinets

Small children are especially susceptible to accidents within the home; therefore, pay particular attention to any cabinets low to the ground containing:

• Electrical equipment or potentially exposed wires
• Toxic materials or cleaning supplies (anything containing bleach, for example)
• Sharp objects or tools (such as power drills or knives)

A simple padlock can help ensure that your child steers clear of getting into anything that could potentially cause them harm. Keep your keys to your locks in a designated area, either on your keyring or hanging somewhere out of your child's reach.

Lighten Up

To maintain maximum visibility at night, consider automatically timed or motion sensitive lights on the exterior of your home. While such lighting can help you avoid mishaps such as a slip-and-falls, they also act as great deterrents for burglars. Your lighting should cover any entryways into your home, including the garage, sidewalk, the front door and any side entrances.

Secret Surveillance

Security systems can be incredibly expensive; however, oftentimes a secret surveillance system can be just about as good as the real thing.

Dummy security cameras are relatively inexpensive, although you should avoid buying the cheapest models possible which could be identified by a burglar as being fake. Models that have flashing lights or detect motion are more convincing than plastic, stationary dummies.

Securing your home for the sake of your family doesn't have to be an overwhelming affair. Instead, consider the small steps you can take to make your home safer that you can do yourself with the right tools at your disposal.