What type of Abode Have you Settled Upon?

[imp]

Do you own a house, condo, townhouse? Got a mortgage on it?

Do you rather rent, same kind of abodes?

Do you travel a lot?

How is your home's security assured if you travel?

Can you give advice regarding security?

Have you ever been devastated by the experience of returning to a break-in?

imp

 

[Warrigal]

My responses in blue.

Do you own a house, condo, townhouse? Got a mortgage on it?
We live in the same cottage that we built in 1966 and we paid off the mortgage in 1985.
Do you rather rent, same kind of abodes?
No
Do you travel a lot?
A fair bit
How is your home's security assured if you travel?
We tell the neighbours that we're going away and when we will return.
They collect the mail from the letter box. We lock the front and back doors and the windows. We don't lock the wire 'security' doors.
Can you give advice regarding security?
Not really. In my opinion security just keeps me out but won't deter a burglar in the slightest.
Have you ever been devastated by the experience of returning to a break-in?
No, but we have returned and found that we were locked out because one of our kids had been in the home and when they left they locked the front wire door. We were dog tired and that was very frustrating. A neighbour popped the 'security door' with a crow bar and we gained entry. Easy !!!
imp

 

[Pappy]

We live in a manufactured home in a 55 or older community. Our home was paid for in 2010.

We still travel, back and forth, to upstate New York once a year where we stay at a campsite for five months.

Security in our Florida home is senior patrol, neighborhood watch and I am surrounded by several retired policemen. My neighbor has a key to my house and checks several times while we are gone. Big concern here is A/C unit stopping. Most snow birds leave their units running, otherwise mold will form because of no circulation.

No break ins as of yet and are quite rare in our community. The upstate campgrounds are another story. Two years ago, several propane tanks were missing. It stopped when the state police raided a crack house next street over. The tanks were being used to cook the stuff.

 

[Jackie22]

I own a small brick house,two bedrooms, two baths in a fairly safe area, when I travel my relatives look after the house, I have never had a break-in...knock on wood.

 

[Bobw235]

Still in the same house we bought 32 years ago, a split ranch. We paid it off the year my son went off to college, so we've been mortgage free for many years now. We've spent quite a bit upgrading (inside and out) it in the past ten years and now find ourselves pondering when to sell and where to move. With my wife's parents likely to be brought up north from their FL home, we're in a situation where moving is now out of the question for the time being. We're actually meeting with a home energy expert today to have an audit to see about improvements we can make so that it's more comfortable in the colder weather.

No problem with break-ins, but we live on a street that's quiet with neighbors who always seem to be around. That said, when we do start to travel regularly, I may invest in more security beyond good locks.

 

[Ameriscot]

My husband bought our 3 bedroom house 21 years ago (before we met) as a holiday home and future retirement home - he worked in London so it was his second home. We are staying put. We love the house, the big garden, and the location. It's in a quiet coastal community but is convenient for getting to airport and city hospitals.

Yes, we travel a lot on long trips. Upcoming trip is for 3 months. Crime is not an issue where we live and due to the location would be very inconvenient for burglars to break in and not get caught. No burglaries or any other crimes as far back as anyone can remember. We tell our next door neighbour we are leaving and he always promises to phone the fire department if he sees flames shooting out of the windows. He has a key to our house.

Our friends who live less than a mile away come and check on the house every week while we are gone and water my weeping fig tree. The water is turned off while we are gone and the heat systems computer is set to holiday mode. The battery is removed from the car. Our mail comes through a slot in the front door so that is not an issue.

 

[jujube]

We live in Florida 7-8 months a year and travel the rest of the time in our RV. Our home, though a free-standing structure, is considered a "condo" so all outside work is taken care of by the condo association. We have no security system. We leave the air conditioning on just enough to keep the humidity down.

His son checks our mail every couple of weeks and calls us if there is anything important.

If we ever sell this house, I doubt we'd buy another one. We'd either live in our RV full-time or move out of Florida.

We've never had a break-in but my car was stolen from in front of the house five years ago.

 

[Don M.]

When we retired, we bought 40 acres in the deep woods, and had a nice 32X76 modular home built to put on it. Finding a contractor way out here to build a regular house looked like a year long project, so we opted for a manufactured house. This thing, sitting over a full basement/garage, gives us over 4800 sq. ft., and with 4 bedrooms, and 3 bathrooms, we have plenty of room when the kids/grandkids come by to visit for a day or two. We paid cash for everything, and I think the last time we paid any interest on anything was probably back in the mid 1980's...when we finally got out from under mortgages, car payments, etc.

As for security, that has been a non-issue in the 13+ years we've been here. There is just one road in/out of this area, and all the neighbors kind of keep an eye on the comings and goings....plus, most of the people out here are hunters, and any thief, etc., coming into this area, might not make it back to the highway.

 

[imp]

Don, your modular then was set on top of some sort of foundation? Is the basement below grade level? I ask these things based on what little I know about our own, which is "pit-set" as they call it here. A wall of 8-8-16 concrete blocks surrounds it completely with a "jog" at either end to allow ventilation and access. There are 5 courses of block, 40" height. The bottom of the walls outside are flush with the top of the block. There is no "skirting" of any kind. (hate that appearance!)

Specifically, and I can not get direct info, yet, is the question of whether there is any kind of footing supporting the block. The top surface remains very flat and straight, all cores filled flush with concrete. I'm aiming to use it to lay a veneer of brick or rock clean up to eave level. Question is, whether the block is adequately supported. imp

 

[Don M.]

Don, your modular then was set on top of some sort of foundation? Is the basement below grade level?

Yes, we are sitting over a full basement. They dug out a monster hole, and built the basement with reinforced concrete, and the house sits about 2 feet above ground level, except for the west end which is graded down to ground level. There are 6 windows in the basement, and I walled off about 1000 sq ft for a roomy two car garage on the west end. The rest of the basement is just storage, home gym, chest freezer and spare refrigerator, etc, and ductwork to supply warm air from the outdoor wood furnace. The floor is anchored to the foundation with Florida hurricane straps every 3 feet....if we got hit, the house might be wiped out, but the floor and basement area should be a pretty good storm shelter. The dirt that was removed for the foundation was used to grade the yard nicely to supply good drainage during rainy weather.

All told, its been a pretty good setup, with only a few minor problems over the years...far less than the site built home we had up in the city. At some point, I will have to have the roof redone, and new carpeting...if we stay here many more years....it all depends upon how our health holds up.