S/O - Privacy/Security on your property

House in the suburbs in Southern California. 6 ft fences gates are locked. Doors always locked. The windows on the garage doors have opaque film so no one can see in we added it when we say reports of people using their phones to look in the windows. We don’t leave the garage open longer than we have to but also won’t put anything out in the front where someone could easily grab. Windows in most of the downstairs well the exposed ones have blinds that remain closed. We don’t leave things out on the porch that could walk off. We have a ring doorbell but no other cameras. We replaced the screws on the doors with the longer ones that are supposed to make it harder to kick in. If we leave windows open downstairs in the summer we put dowels in to prevent someone opening them.

I can’t imagine not having fences or blinds. Our neighbor right across from us leaves their blinds open to the park and you can see their dining room, stairs and living room without trying. I would feel like I was living in a fish bowl especially since it’s off the park like we are and people walk their dogs pretty close to our property and occasional kids or gardeners will set off our ring lol. There are trails behind our houses so people are walking out there a lot.

We like our privacy.

Middle of a major city with a skyrocketing crime rate. We've always kept our doors and windows locked at all times as well as been much more security conscious than most people. It's the result of having lived in some unsafe countries and having been robbed once. So we make no apologies for going overboard. Some of the things we have done in the past couple of years: changed out all exterior doors to ones with triple deadbolt system, LED exterior lighting around the entire perimeter of the house under the eaves that are on all night, new iron gate on driveway that is stronger, added iron gate to other side of house which helps secure the a/c unit.

We do have exterior cameras and a local security system (doors/windows) that is monitored. Will be upgrading the system next month for one with more exterior camera coverage.

Several years ago, after DH had the exterior mirror covers stolen off a 1 week old car, we cleaned out the garage and made room for the cars.  That is when we added a gate opener to the driveway gate as well.  We now keep our cars in the garage and the doors down.  There have been multiple cases of neighbors who have had their cars not garage kept being broken into and/or all four of the tires stolen with the cars left on blocks.  Even with that happening, I am amazed the same people continue to leave their cars out at night on the street or in the driveway!



We moved here in 1991 - that same year you keep hearing talked about on the news as being the worst ever crime rates here...until now. So I don't think I have ever felt 100% safe here! Until the recent uptick in crime I did feel more comfortable, but never complete safe.

I live in a small suburb of a large metropolitan area. The house has an attached garage with security cameras on all entry points with motion lights on the driveway in front and on the back yard. Our yard is almost two acres so it’s too big for traditional fencing. We have invisible fence for our big dog. We keep all of our doors locked (even the service door between the house and garage) at all times. DH put in the dead bolts with the numbered key pads so none of us need to carry keys. The only time our patio door isn’t locked is if we’re right there on the deck grilling or taking our dogs out. I don’t leave first floor windows open at night or if DH isn’t home.

There have been so many reports recently of mail theft, porch pirates, catalytic converter thefts, vehicle break-ins and outright vehicle thefts (including trailers) that it would be dumb to not have some kind of security these days. We got a large locking mailbox several years ago when there was a rash of mail theft in our general neighborhood. 

Rural-ish WV.
Neighborhood homes are on 1-1.5 acre lots, and no one has a fenced yard.
We have a fence around pool but not the rest of the yard.
We do have outdoor cameras and lights.
All doors and windows stay locked, with the exception of the doors to our garage and deck during the day since we are in and out through those a lot during the day. Doing a door check is part of our evening routine once everyone is in for the night.

Do you let the dog out unsupervised or have an invisible fence? What about when you’re kids were little—when could they play outside unsupervised?

I’m taking advantage of this thread to ask the questions that run through my head when I visit parts of the country with unfenced yards. 😂

We let the dogs in and out about a 100 times a day. And the kids could play in fenced back yard a few years before they were allowed to play out front unsupervised.

We live in an area zoned rural residential so all the lots are on 1-3 acres and the whole neighborhood is only 30 houses surrounded by farms and ranches. No fences - which was a shock to my system growing up in the Bay ARea where I'd never seen a house without the backyard fenced. When just the two of us are home the doors are always locked as we go through the garage, but when the kids are home the front door is often unlocked as their friends come and go regularly. Windows are almost always open all night in the summer as we have an attic fan to cut down on the a/c bill and it's almost always cool at night. I'm sure our dog will let us know if there's an intruder.

When we had a dog, we had an invisible fence (but didn't depend on it.) I usually went out with her, and she stayed in our yard. I'd sit on the front porch and throw the ball for her. And yes, it tended to be about 100 times a day.

I went outside with the kids, too, until they were old enough. We have a screened porch where I could see the entire backyard, so the kids could play on the swingset while in full sight of me. I live on a super quiet street, and only a handful of cars a day pass my house.

We live in a rural area with a decent amount of land. No fenced yard, but we have fenced fields. We have a security system with door and window alarms and motion sensors. We also have cameras; that are mostly used to monitor cat movement outside and package deliveries.  We keep our doors unlocked during the day usually , but lock up at night and set the alarm.

I live in a town of about 150,000. We have a six foot privacy fence - no lock on the gate. We leave the windows open anytime the weather is nice - night or day. Front door always locked, but if we are home the back doors are probably unlocked. No security system or cameras - just a porch light. I know bad things can happen anywhere, but if I didn’t feel safe enough to open my windows at night, I would move if possible.

Our property is bordered on the north by a creek. On the other side of that creek is a 3 acre property with a home on the west end. The rest of that property is a lovely meadow. We have a picket fence on 3 sides of the back because we once had a dog. Immediately adjacent to our home the fence is a 6 ft privacy fence so that passerby on the street do not view our back yard. The privacy fence is about 15 feet along the sides of the back and then the picket fence completes the fencing.

I feel very secure in the back because any thief would have to cross the creek, climb the steep bank to enter from the back. Our neighbors are retired or work from home (precovid). Now we are retired so someone is here 80%of the time.

I've lived in villages, towns, maybe not very large as some US "towns" and the second largest city in England when I was at University and most, if not all, of the properties I have lived in have had a fence or even a brick wall in some older properties, surrounding the rear of the properties on three sides. 
As gar mentioned in her post, most of UK properties have either a fence or a brick wall for their rear garden ( yard) and the front too. They are there to define your property's legal boundary more than anything but serve as a level of privacy too if they happen to be higher in height .I can't imagine a property with nothing to define the boundary. Even on larger country properties there is usually a dense hedge to the properties.

I do have a gate to the rear of the property I live in now and it does have a bolt that you can pull across to secure it. It was there when we moved in. You can open it from the other side if you put your arm over the top. The people that lived here before us had small children so I'm guessing they put it there to stop the children wondering off. The gate is 6 foot high so they wouldn't have been able to reach the bolt.

As for security. I do have a motion sensor light for the front and back but that is there more for our benefit if we happen to come home when it's  dark rather than to stop intruders as such. I lock my back door if we go out but it's usually unlocked when someone is home. I don't actually" lock" my front door if we are at home as you can't open it from the outside without a key. I have double glazed windows that are virtually impossible to break or to prise open for any intruders to break in. 

This is not my neighborhood but very similar to the last house I lived in that was on a culdesac. Our properties were not large. No one had a fence. Kids could run entirely around the culdesac through the backyards and often played through.  



Our houses were on a hill and our neighbors’ lawn across from our house had a huge green space that went down to a pond that became a huge sledding hill in the winter and the kids could just walk across the street to go sledding. It was a great place when all the families were younger. 

J u l e e thank you 😊 That doesn’t look dissimilar to uk suburban housing but each house would be fenced - the rear gardens certainly although the front areas are sometimes/often ‘open’. In your picture how would people know where they can put plants, their kids swing, barbecue etc?

I live on 120 acres in northern MN. No fences, no security. We only lock our doors at night, and my dh makes fun of me for doing it. I leave windows open during the day and night during the summer. We have great neighbors down the road, and we watch out for each other for strange vehicles or people at our houses.