8 Affordable Ways To Improve the Security of Your Home

If you’re looking for ideas and suggestions on how to improve the security of your home then check out our insightful guide below.

Many of the suggestions on this page are targeted to those on a tight budget but we still feel they’re an effective deterrent.

1 – Secure The Boundary

Spikes are often used to keep cats and foxes out of the garden.

However, they’re also suitable for deterring burglars too.

Thieves look for easy targets and climbing over fences and walls with either grease or spikes on them isn’t their preferred option.

Anti–climb paint (also known as non-drying paint, anti-intruder paint, anti-vandal grease) is a class of paint consisting of a thick oily coating – Wikipedia

Explore these affordable products:

Anti-climb paint is affordable and easy to apply. Available from Amazon

Wall spikes to prevent foxes from entering the garden

Wall spikes – cheap and easy to install. On sale here.

2 – Gravel Driveways

Burglars prefer to create as little noise as possible when gaining entry to a house.

I’ve yet to meet a person that can walk across a gravel driveway without making a distinctive crunching sound.

While digging up an existing driveway and replacing it with a gravel one may not seem the most practical or cheapest option, do consider gravel if and when you upgrade your driveway in the future.

This page contains a price guide for installing a gravel driveway.

3 – Window Alarms

If a fully-fledged alarm system isn’t within your budget (see how much monitored alarms cost here), you can fit window alarms to the glass panels of your windows.

These small and affordable devices are triggered by vibrations and produce an impressive 100db siren to scare off any burglars attempting to break into your property:

Explore customer reviews of this product here.

4 – Lighting

Burglars don’t like to be seen, so shining a bright light into your front and rear gardens is a great way to put off potential thieves.

Lights with motion sensors are competitively priced and typically cost less than £20.

This variant is currently on sale for £17

5 – Install a Dummy Alarm

If you can’t afford a full alarm system (even though there are cheap options), consider installing a dummy alarm.

These are easy to bolt onto the external wall and are an effective deterrent.

Pro tip: Make sure you choose one that has a light so it looks authentic.

Alarm with LED light. Read reviews here.

6 – CCTV Camera System – Fake or Real

CCTV systems placed in a visible location can act as an excellent deterrent to burglars. This dummy product is perfect for those on a tight budget and is currently on sale at Amazon for less than £12.

Nest Cam has a product that records and stores footage online for up to 30 days. Their service isn’t cheap but you can log in via their app and view the footage at any time. You can even view live footage.

Also, see how much real CCTV camera systems cost to purchase and install.

7 – Fox Sprayer by PestBye

We first discussed this product as part of our guide to deterring foxes from entering the garden.

This ingenious device has a motion sensor that activates a powerful jet of water and also rotates to cover a large area of the garden. Some variants also emit a loud clicking noise to startle the foxes and perhaps even burglars.

This is a great product but does have some pitfalls.

It’s triggered by movement, so cats, dogs, foxes and even large birds such as pigeons trigger the jet of water. The noise could be an issue at night if wild animals are regularly entering the garden.

Here’s a video showing the device working well at deterring a fox, it’s plausible that this product could put off an intruder as well: