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A Burglary Alarm - Your Vital Early Warning System

Boost your ability to combat home intruders with a quality burglary alarm. Enjoy the benefit of enough time prepare an effective defense or an escape to safety.

I really believe that having an early warning system that will wake you up in the dead of night when criminals are trying to get into your living room is a basic security need every family should invest in.

Seriously, If you don't have one, get one!

Alarms should ideally be connected (via the phone lines or a radio connection) to a security company that has an armed response team. Without such a team, an alarm is just a very loud noise that will irritate your neighbors!

Unfortunately, it's very unlikely that any of them will come running to help you if your siren goes off in the middle of the night. Even if you have really great neighbors, the fact is that they may be afraid to come to your aid (in case there really are criminals trying to break into your home).

The other more likely reason is that they may think it is just a false alarm. They would be correct most of the time.

In other words, most times when an alarm is waking up the whole neighborhood, there is actually NO CRIME being committed.

How can that be?

Reasons for false alarms include:

• Bad weather conditions
• Faulty electrical wiring
• Human error
• Insects getting into the sensors (especially ants)
• Pets setting off the motion sensors

The positive factors of having a burglary alarm are far more important in my view. The sound of the alarm being set off (the noisy siren or bell) may cause burglars run away for fear of being caught.

An alarm also gives homeowners an early warning that criminals are trying to break into the house. This is especially important if they try to break in at night while the homeowners are asleep.

A Burglary Alarm Gives You Time To "Get Ready"

The reality is that the burglars may not be scared away by the noisy siren. They may be drunk, on drugs or they may simply not care about the chance of being caught.

If that is the case, you should get yourselves ready to DO SOMETHING!

You may choose to:

• Get the children into the master bedroom as quickly as possible
• Arm yourself with a gun or other weapon
• Lock yourself in the master bedroom or a “safe room”
• Climb out the window
• Escape out the back door
• Call the police or a neighbor for help

False Sense Of Security

Too many people falsely believe that just by having an alarm, they are completely safe. They believe no criminal can get to them because "the alarm" will scare them away every time.

This is just NOT TRUE!

You must remember that an alarm can only be relied on to give you a short amount of time to “get ready” in some way. It MIGHT NOT scare away the criminals for various reasons (as discussed above).

The armed response team may take several minutes (or in some case much longer) to get to your house. Several minutes is a LONG time during a criminal attack.

Many people have been killed or severely hurt before the police have arrived at their home. You need to have a realistic plan for what you will do when that alarm starts shrieking in the night.

Don’t just HOPE that the police will come and save you in time. It may not happen that way! See my page on Police Response Time for more details.

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