House alarm... worth it?

[bigandclever]

I'm assuming the answer will be 'Yes', but which type?

DIY, wireless (Yale Digital)... about £400 outright purchase, no monitoring or maintenance

Installed, wireless (ADT)... about £1000 for 3 year 'rental' incl monitoring and maintenance

Installed, wireless (independent reseller)... about £800 purchase plus £750 3 years monitoring and maintenance

Or should I be looking at wired?

[KrazyIvan]

Two ways of looking at it.

Are there many houses in your street that have been broken into in the last 18mnts?

And it is better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it.

For what's its worth my farther helped me install ours a few years back (was about £250 for a wired system that covered the 2 exterior doors and all the windows and interior doors).

[Accelebrate]

I went for the DIY wired option for a few hundred pounds. I have the sort of neighbours who do quickly investigate if they hear something, so I reckon it's probably worth it.

I also went for a phone dialler, it's nice to know I'd hopefully be notified very quickly if something was amiss.

[Rosscow]

Depends on your house and your neighbourhood I guess.

I put one in at our last house, cost me about £450. I used it for the first 6 months then didn't bother for the next 4 years.

I don't have one at the moment....

[bigandclever]

I'd like to say the area's fine but after someone coming into the back garden and nicking my bike (while we were in) the missus is a bit twitchy. I'm pondering whether a couple of dummy boxes will be enough of a deterrent, or whether just to get something put in for the sake of a few quid. Mind you, I'm also tempted to get some security shutters on the back. Like these, but with slats in to let some light in...



Having a bit of a circular argument with the missus on that one... she says she doesn't want them becasue they're ugly (they are); I say I want them because they're prettier than what some ratboy would do in the house, if they ever broke in.

[mikees]

ADT every time. Had on last 3 houses.

[toxgobbler]

We went for an ADT in this house and the last, we have never been broken into. But as the jokes goes:

Two guys are in the jungle when they see a lion running towards them. Frantically, one of the men starts putting on his running shoes.
Surprised, the other man says " What are you thinking, you can't outrun a lion!!!"
" I don't have to outrun the lion," said the man, " I just have to outrun you."

Make your house a less desirable target and they will go elsewhere for an easy life.

[Silver]

We got one after we were burgled. Yes, shutting the gate, I know, but along with other security measures it makes the house just that bit less desirable for opportunists. Costs about £90 per year but that's just for maintenance. Monitored costs more.

[thegman]

As said above - you have got to consider that the mind set of most burglars is opportunistic. They are weighing up risk vs reward. So keep the risks high (an alarm to alert neighbours or even police, security lights, doors and windows that will take time to open) and the rewards low (don't leave anything valuable visible). If you do this in all likelyhood your house will look less appealing that somebody who doesnt take security as seriously.

Also, most people really believe it wont happen to them. Until is does and then they will realise how careless they were.

[rossmc88]

My security system is that my house isn't worth breaking into

I don't have enough money to buy anything worth stealing

This approach works a treat

[RC1]

ive been umming and ahhing about this one for ages and finally committed to doing a diy job with some fairly swanky wireless gear by texecom.... parts would cost me about 800 but after a recent 'experience' i will get the pros in

im going to have to spend over 1000 but the way i see it if something more sinister ever did happen and god forbid something terrible happened id always wonder whether the alarm may have helped deter the peasant/s

that peace of mind is worth much more than the cost to install

the rest of the folk have alarms (or at least boxes with strobes) and mine does as well but its clear that its a dummy

feel free to PM for further info as i have been researching this space for quite a while and am now in the early stages of getting responses out from my 'tender'

[northwest monkey]

A mate of mine builds / renovates commercial property & recommended a place called Swift (http://www.swiftfireandsecurity.com/). We paid just over £1k & to be honest I like the piece of mind it gives me when I'm out. It can be monitored (I remember filling in forms about hazards in case the Police were ever called) & has plenty of zones. I think we've had them out once in 8 years to look at the system & that's only because I'd moved a sensor & it needed resetting. If I'd looked in the manual I could have done it myself!

It has different settings for bedtime as well - we can walk around upstairs but downstairs is alarmed etc. Arming/disarming it is dead easy - I have a sort of fob thing I touch the panel with & it works. When you're coming in the house with kids/shopping etc you're not pissing around tapping numbers in!

We did look at ADT, but the monthly cost (about £30 at the time) put us off rather than paying £1k up front.