AS SAFE AS HOUSES?
Buying presents for other people or yourself is a fantastic feeling – but is your home safe enough to store valuable items?
Can you believe this? A new survey claims one in 11 have already started shopping for Christmas – even though the time for tinsel and toys is still seven months distant. Those early shoppers have already spent an average £658, according to American Express.
There can be good reasons in shopping early – booking for Christmas fairs, shows, visits to Santa in Lapland and other midwinter activities can be cheaper although you’ll miss out on Black Friday promotions.
Springtime Christmas shoppers often buy jewellery. And this could mean early, easy pickings for thieves with homes having expensive items still in their wrappings, ready to steal and sell.
Thieves are always on the lookout for “bling” – some couples, inspired by the forthcoming royal wedding, are laying out on jewellery, although probably less expensive than Meghan and Harry’s.
Burglars are clever at spotting which homes have gold and silver worth stealing and which flats and houses they see as a “waste of time” because the inhabitants wear cheap bangles and plastic watches.
They’ll look through windows, or watch to see where people wearing expensive jewellery or top of the range watches live. A £1,000 mobile phone will also attract thieves who reckon if someone can afford that much, they must have other things worth nicking. And even if criminals are wrong and you don’t have anything valuable, they’ll damage your home breaking in and searching.
They know that most people who have home safes keep them in bedrooms so they head there first. It’s also where most valuables are stored as well. Safes rarely deter determined thieves. They’ll lever them from the wall, take them away in a car and break them open later when no one is watching.
Last year, Halifax Home Insurance dealt with 437 claims for stolen jewellery. Multiply that for all the other insurers means there were tens of thousands of homes where break-ins led to bling going missing. So it’s a real danger.
The insurer says many older people have forgotten that jewellery and other gold bought many years ago has soared in value. The meltdown value of wedding rings has increased around 50 times over the past 50 years.
Insurers will pay out if valuables are stolen. But many will offer replicas of what you have lost – they can’t do anything about sentimental value.