Anyone been burgled?

[Susiejb]

noseall sorry to hear about your intrusion, you can be as pragmatic as you like, but it is simply not on.
What right has a has anyone to go in to your property uninvited and help themselves to what is not theirs?

Totally agree PBD ...... what makes people do that ?
I just don't understand it ......
Hope you get sorted soon noseall and that your insurance covers your losses, excellent advice about fire by the way...I hope everyone on here has smoke alarms fitted.

 

[joe-90]

Which type though? Ionising or optical?

 

[Susiejb]

Which type though? Ionising or optical?

smoke alarms

 

[Alarm]

Optical for landings, halls ect.
Ioniszation for bedrooms.

Just in case anyone needed to know.

Oh yeah, heat or rate of rise for kitchens.

 

[Susiejb]

Optical for landings, halls ect.
Ioniszation for bedrooms.

Just in case anyone needed to know.

Oh yeah, heat or rate of rise for kitchens.

To be honest I just bought 'smoke alarms' ....

 

[Alarm]

Which is why many have false alarms with them
They do actually say on the boxes, even from B & Q.

 

[Susiejb]

Which is why many have false alarms with them
They do actually say on the boxes, even from B & Q.

Thank you

 

[amy9]

I find it strange how many people have the attitude of 'oh well, it just happens'...

I was burgled in my last year of University and it has affected me ever since. I lived in that house in terror until we were able to move out and I have refused to live in a house since.

I now live in an apartment in a *fingers crossed* seemingly secure building. I don't want to live in a house nor will I live on the ground floor of an apartment building.

I still have regular nightmares about people breaking into my home, and I still jump at odd noises when I'm home alone. This was about five years ago now too.

I wasn't actually in when we got burgled and they didn't mess up anything but it has affected me majorly.

If I ever do live in a house I want two large dogs at least, steel front and back doors and reinforced double glazing. No joke.

 

[noseall]

I find it strange how many people have the attitude of 'oh well, it just happens'...

I was burgled in my last year of University and it has affected me ever since. I lived in that house in terror until we were able to move out and I have refused to live in a house since.

I now live in an apartment in a *fingers crossed* seemingly secure building. I don't want to live in a house nor will I live on the ground floor of an apartment building.

I still have regular nightmares about people breaking into my home, and I still jump at odd noises when I'm home alone. This was about five years ago now too.

I wasn't actually in when we got burgled and they didn't mess up anything but it has affected me majorly.

If I ever do live in a house I want two large dogs at least, steel front and back doors and reinforced double glazing. No joke.

Did you receive counselling? We were contacted within a few days by a nicely spoken lady but we declined.

It seems as though being burgled has affected you greatly.

 

[amy9]

I find it strange how many people have the attitude of 'oh well, it just happens'...

I was burgled in my last year of University and it has affected me ever since. I lived in that house in terror until we were able to move out and I have refused to live in a house since.

I now live in an apartment in a *fingers crossed* seemingly secure building. I don't want to live in a house nor will I live on the ground floor of an apartment building.

I still have regular nightmares about people breaking into my home, and I still jump at odd noises when I'm home alone. This was about five years ago now too.

I wasn't actually in when we got burgled and they didn't mess up anything but it has affected me majorly.

If I ever do live in a house I want two large dogs at least, steel front and back doors and reinforced double glazing. No joke.

Did you receive counselling? We were contacted within a few days by a nicely spoken lady but we declined.

It seems as though being burgled has affected you greatly.

No I didn't. Should I have been offered it? The police came round, took a statement and that was the last we heard.

 

[RedHerring2]

I think the counselling thing will depend very much on how recently the event happened.
The last time I was burgled was probably over 10 years ago. I never received any offers of counselling for any of the burglaries.

It could also be a regional thing, or even an insurance thing.

 

[masona]

Sorry to hear this, it's a sad world we live in

Armed raiders with masks will force their way into a home if they are so inclined, regardless of pets, alarms, bells or whistles.

That's true but I would've thought armed raiders are targeting mostly the wealthy.

None of the upstairs windows are locked, nor will they ever be locked.

The problem will be that your insurance will be invalid, happened to Cilla Black losing out on her claims because the windows wasn't locked upstair even though they didn't break via the windows

They broke the large pane of glass in the upper part of my rear upvc door and climbed in and out of there

This is the reason I will not fit any upvc doors unless I tell the clients of the high risk of break in. I can break into most of them without even making too much noise! You can't beat a solid wooden doors

In this instance secure locks or ANY locks were a waste of time.

Well maybe but a good locks is harder to break in.

CCTV or an alarm may have saved the day, but they ignored the alarm at the house up the road.

Yes I go along with that but mostly they will walk pass it, I have 9 cctv 24hrs recording plus alarm and fire alarm. Over the top? maybe but I feel I have a better chance they will leave my property alone.

Turn your house into a fortress and at the same time turn it into a prison.

I know but what's the answer? You can do a lot to beef it up, walk around your property and see how you would break in then see what you can do to make it harder. I even have 1" angle iron on each side of the door frame covered by mouldings protecting the hinges and door latch, will have to make one hell of a noise to break in and hoping they will give up!

 

[Djnikon]

A few years ago a friend of mine had an attempted burglary. I say attempted as it all went a bit wrong for the intruder. A bunch of us were going on holiday for a couple of weeks, golfing to Portugal, 12 of us in total and we were due to leave on the Saturday morning. We got a call on the Friday telling us our flight had been changed to the Sunday afternoon (offer to cancel but we all still wanted to go) so we all decided just to crash at my friends house on the Saturday night and have a few beers.
Forward to that night at just after midnight we were awoken by a loud bang in the kitchen (the door getting jimmied open) and some broken glass. Next thing we know a light appears in the living room and there is a bloke standing in the doorway with a bar. I think to his surprise the lights all came on and he was suddenly confronted by 12 unhappy blokes - with golf clubs nearby... - and the last thing he heard before having the absolute s*** knocked out of him was the back door being closed and an unfriendly voice in his ear saying "you're getting it pal!".
Anyhoo the moral of this tale is be careful who you tell your travel plans to. It turned out that a work colleague of my friend tipped off this undesirable about the fact that he was going on holiday for 2 weeks and when he was leaving. Luckily that delay to the flight meant that all he had to worry about was a broken door (and a sore hand after paggering the bloke a fair bit)....

 

[StephenW]

This is relevant for us as we were burgled two weeks ago. After attempting but failing to get in the UPVC back door, they got in through a locked window by bending the anodised aluminum frame (Everest windows) and exited by the back door (key near door). They stole (only) my wife's engagement ring and a gold necklet so it was obvious that they only wanted gold or cash (neither of which we have!) as they left other obvious valuables.
They were so tidy, we didn't even notice for 24 hours!
My wife's obviously upset but we don't feel too violated as they did not make any mess. The door and window are being repaired under insurance.
It may have been a case of the wrong house as a near neighbour was burgled on the same night and had several thousand pounds of gold and cash stolen.
It was the first time I'd even heard of a burglary happening in our road since I moved in 26 years ago. But it does put you on edge.

 

[noseall]

noseall wrote:
Armed raiders with masks will force their way into a home if they are so inclined, regardless of pets, alarms, bells or whistles.

That's true but I would've thought armed raiders are targeting mostly the wealthy

Not so. Due to cars being impossible to start, armed raiders are often targeting a specific car, even one that may have a chav as its owner..

Quote:
None of the upstairs windows are locked, nor will they ever be locked.

The problem will be that your insurance will be invalid, happened to Cilla Black losing out on her claims because the windows wasn't locked upstair even though they didn't break via the windows

Having an unlocked window does not invalidate your insurance. Declaring that you have lockable windows and benefitting from reduced premiums claiming that they are always locked and subsequently not locking them may lead to a raised eyebrow providing that they did not smash the glass to gain entry. There are many housed that don't have a locking window facility.

Quote:
They broke the large pane of glass in the upper part of my rear upvc door and climbed in and out of there

This is the reason I will not fit any upvc doors unless I tell the clients of the high risk of break in. I can break into most of them without even making too much noise! You can't beat a solid wooden doors

Everyone of us has glazing in some form so we are all just as vulnerable as each other. If it hadn't been the door it would have been the window next to it.