Home Defense Tactics: Protecting Your Loved Ones in Critical Situations

While it can be scary to think about an intruder breaking into your home, the reality is that it happens to people every day. Every year, 2.5 million burglaries occur in the United States. Over half of those are home invasions, which means people are inside their home when the theft occurs.

But you could just call the police if someone invades your home, right? Yes, but the average police response time has increased in recent years. While the police arrived in about 11 minutes in 2017, in many cities, like New York City, it now takes up to 33 minutes.

You can’t rely on the police alone to protect your family. What you can do is arm yourself with knowledge and skills like what we’re sharing below to protect your home and loved ones against armed invaders.

1. Assess Vulnerabilities: Conduct a Home Security Audit & Strengthen Perimeter Security

The first step to defend your home is to not make it look enticing to intruders. Perform a home security audit and strengthen your home security system in these critical areas:

Lighting

Walk outside of your home and look at the front porch.

• Ensure that you have proper lighting around the whole perimeter. 
• Add motion detector lights so that the entire front and back yard is flooded if someone steps onto the property.

Vegetation

Next, think about the vegetation on your property. 

• Trim back all bushes and trees that cover up the view of the house.
• If it’s within your budget, put thorny bushes like roses, agave, or barberry underneath all windows to deter people from breaking in.

Points of Entry

Then, you need to reinforce every point of entry in your home. 

• Doors should be made of wood or steel if possible and locked with a solid deadbolt.
• Glass doors or windows near the door make it easy for intruders to enter. 
• If you have a dog door, lock it securely or remove it to prevent easy access.
• Add locks to windows as well so that they’re impossible to open from the outside.

Never leave a key outside the property, even in a lock box, because this compromises the safety of your home.

Home Security

Add as much home security as possible to defend your home while you’re away or asleep and give you footage of intruders. 

• Install cameras outside the home to deter people from attempting a break-in. 
• An alarm system inside makes loud noises to scare burglars and alerts authorities that a crime is happening.
• Many of these now can be used through an app on your phone (like Ring doorbells and cameras), so you can monitor your cameras and alarms while you’re away.

2. Develop a Family Emergency Plan

One of the smartest things you can do is to develop a family emergency plan so that no one panics and makes a poor decision in a crisis. To make your emergency plan, you need to think through the needs of your family.

• If you have children, then assign certain children to each adult in the home. 
• Pick a place in your house, like a safe room, where the kids and adults know to go if someone breaks in. 
• Choose how you will communicate with each other, like with a cell phone or burner phone, and have an emergency contact ready to call if you need help.
• Last, choose one of the adults to be well versed in home defense tactics so they can protect the rest of the family if an intruder is armed.

3. Train for Home Defense Situations

Train before the crisis happens. 

• Take self-defense classes so you can improve your reflexes in dangerous situations.
• If you own a firearm be sure to take firearms classes before using it to ensure that you don’t accidentally hurt yourself or one of your loved ones. 

Tactical defense training for home defense scenarios teaches you how to use a gun and covers mental techniques to ensure you’re prepared for the stress of the situation. By learning from an expert in a professional training program, you’ll gain insight and clarity from someone experienced in dangerous situations.

Prepare for Any Situation at United Defense Tactical

There’s no warning before a home invasion, so make sure you’re ready by making your home less appealing to intruders, developing a family emergency plan, and training for a home defense situation.

If you’re looking to learn more about firearm safety and how to protect against an armed intruder, then check out the classes at United Defense Tactical. They provide top-tier instruction for anyone, from a military expert to a civilian who has never picked up a gun before.

Learn to protect your family and sign up for a course at UDT today.