Reasonable steps to take to secure belongings in shared space?

[Darrell KSR]

Good chance next week daughter will be moving into a shared living space where her bedroom may or may not be secure when she is not there.

I don't know what type of handle her door will have, so I don't even know if those "door lock covers" would work, and I've seen "iffy" reviews on them anyway. Assume that we will NOT be able to replace the existing door handle/knob/lack of lock that exists.

Only other thing I can think of is getting a small safe for her iPad, medicines, and emergency cash. Without drilling holes into the floor or wall, I'm not sure that's a great solution either. Maybe a cable tied to the bedpost. Hey, if they want it that badly, they'll get it; just trying to make it a little less likely to "walk" in a semi-emergency.

Am I missing some solutions here? The basic instruction is, "don't bring anything valuable," so it's pretty much limited to the items I described, and in a worst case scenario, none of that would be catastrophic. But wouldn't want anything to happen, of course.

EDIT: Oh--here's an idea that I ran across. Drilling a hole in a large steel plate and bolting it to it. Basically, a thief would have to turn the whole thing sideways (if the plate were larger than the width of the door frame) to take it out.

That won't work because daughter may need to "undo" anything I do in case she needs to move herself, which is fairly likely the next time. So picture it needing to be easy for my standards--which is really easy all the time--and then making it easier than that. Probably limits the solutions to just the safe itself.

[dan_bgblue]

If a thief wants it, you and I will not figure out a way to keep it safe. Security camera is the best option to hope for item recovery. Record all serial numbers , take good pictures of the items, ensure the contents of the house or apartment with renters insurance, and hope they drop by when you are not at home.

[Darrell KSR]

If a thief wants it, you and I will not figure out a way to keep it safe. Security camera is the best option to hope for item recovery. Record all serial numbers , take good pictures of the items, ensure the contents of the house or apartment with renters insurance, and hope they drop by when you are not at home.Omg, I cannot believe I forgot about cheap renter's insurance. That suggestion alone made this thread question a good idea, thanks, Dan.

[dan_bgblue]

You can hide small items like jewelry and even cell phones in the walls. Install a false electrical outlet box and face plate in the wall, then put items in small bag and lower them into the wall with string or cord and tie them to the outlet box and replace cover plate.

This idea is for items you do not use on a daily basis, but it makes for a better hiding place than between the box spring and mattress.

[KeithKSR]

I’d get a portable security box and mount it to the inside of a dresser drawer with a screw. We had one like this we kept my late mother in law’s pain meds in, we mounted it to the wall. They are only about $20. If she has to mover herself she could just leave the box and key behind with no big loss.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Master-Lock-Cash-Box/999958297

[Darrell KSR]

I’d get a portable security box and mount it to the inside of a dresser drawer with a screw. We had one like this we kept my late mother in law’s pain meds in, we mounted it to the wall. They are only about $20. If she has to mover herself she could just leave the box and key behind with no big loss.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Master-Lock-Cash-Box/999958297I like that idea too.

[suncat05]

If she is going to have to share an apartment with other people, she's going to have her space invaded.
We had the same issue with our daughter when she was at the University of Florida in Gainesville. But the only real issue then was over food that she kept in her room. Her laptop and her phone stayed on her person the entire time.
She shared the apartment with 3 other girls, one of whom we knew because I worked with her Mom @ the Sheriff's Office.
Sharing an apartment off campus with others that you don't know is an exercise in futility. But sharing a dorm room on campus is even worse.

We bought renter's insurance, recorded all her valuable items serial numbers and took pictures of everything. Keith's idea about the lockbox inside a drawer is a workable idea too.

She has 2 or 3 other roommates, she's going to be encountering new and unknown people every single day. And worse, there'll be times when she leaves, attends classes and such, and then she'll go back to the apartment and one of her knucklehead roommates will have decided to invite half the damn campus to their apartment for a "party". And possibly find someone in her room, because, you know, college kids are kinda dumb like that and don't appreciate and/or respect other people's private spaces. Because they're college students.
I was more concerned about her personal safety than anything else at that time. Little did I know that the Hernandez kid on the football team at that time was a homicidal gangbanger, and let's not forget about Ted Bundy having once prowled Gainesville for innocent victims to murder too.

I hope and pray that she has none of those issues with her roommates.

[kingcat]

https://www.amazon.com/Book-Safe-Combination-Lock-Dictionary/dp/B0728KW8W6/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&linkCode=sl1&tag=ss-com-20&linkId=63608c7eae3650a8136c96a458fbe9b1&language=en_US

[kingcat]

Another thing would be to always keep a fake wallet or hand purse around with a few bucks in it and some unimportant papers. Odds are, a thief would be satisfied with that and do the old grab and go.

The couple of bucks might even keep him or her from coming back to try again.

[Darrell KSR]

All of you guys are really giving some great suggestions. I appreciate them all.

[CitizenBBN]

I just let everyone think I was a a crazy redneck lunatic who would chop them up and feed them to the pigs if they touched my stuff.

(Someone had to break the streak of useful ideas.)

I did have a solution years ago to everyone taking my Cokes. I learned to like Diet Coke. No one on my floor liked diet coke (this was in the 1980s) and neither did I but I learned to like it and no one took any.

[Darrell KSR]

Hey, she's going to be the redneck crazy girl from Alabama in New York. I'm not sure who is more scary.

[CitizenBBN]

In that case my idea may work for her. Seriously, Yankees aren't very smart and think the world falls off a cliff somewhere around Washington DC and picks back up in california. She could easily convince them she's been involved in numerous gunfights and killed several people in duels of honor. Show a vaccine scar or something and tell them it's a bullet graze, they'll believe it. They're dumb as rocks.

Would help if she talked about road kill stew and how she's glad to be out of Alabama b/c of the family blood feud her family is in and how 6 people have died from it in the last year alone. Think yellow journalism of the late 19th century. That seems to be their point of reference for the south.

It worked for me in Chicago for goodness sake and with Yankee transfers in St. Louis. She'll have them cowering in New York.

[suncat05]

In that case my idea may work for her. Seriously, Yankees aren't very smart and think the world falls off a cliff somewhere around Washington DC and picks back up in california. She could easily convince them she's been involved in numerous gunfights and killed several people in duels of honor. Show a vaccine scar or something and tell them it's a bullet graze, they'll believe it. They're dumb as rocks.

Would help if she talked about road kill stew and how she's glad to be out of Alabama b/c of the family blood feud her family is in and how 6 people have died from it in the last year alone. Think yellow journalism of the late 19th century. That seems to be their point of reference for the south.

It worked for me in Chicago for goodness sake and with Yankee transfers in St. Louis. She'll have them cowering in New York.

:sHa_dielaughing::sHa_dielaughing::sHa_dielaughing :

[CitizenBBN]

Seriously, it sounds as if this is protection against fellow workers and staff, not professional thieves breaking in.

If that's the case then a small safe you can cable secure to something may be sufficient. A pro thief will cut the cable and be gone, or rip it out of whatever it is locked to, but a roommate etc. is unlikely to do so. I agree with a bedpost. It works but wouldn't slow down a pro thief. Would it slow down an amateur thief of opportunity? Maybe.

I like Dan's idea of hiding it, but it's tough to know the situation she'll encounter with outlets, etc. in a room. They sell books that hide such things too, but too easy for someone to rummage around and find it in a single dorm style room. But hiding can be effective.

I'll give you another one. Rip part of the dust cover on the box spring and duct tape a shelf in it to slip in an ipad etc. Would likely be missed by someone just looking under the bed for goodies. Also could do that between the mattress/box and the headboard, another place they may not check readily. A pro thief is going to just toss the mattress and box and would find it, but some kid may not.

One idea dependent on the room. If it's a drop ceiling you can hide things in the ceiling tiles. That's a great option for this kind of crime prevention b/c most people won't get up and check tile after tile, or get in position to put their whole head up there to see around. The only trick is that repeated access can be a little dirty and she would have to make sure bits of ceiling tile weren't on the floor giving it away.

[Darrell KSR]

Brief update: all decisions postponed for a couple of months as she has a very secure place of living that doesn't require any of the safeguards we have discussed. After two months, she may/may not need to move, which could necessitate a change in circumstances. In any event, there are a lot of good suggestions here that will apply to her for future situations, regardless.

[dan_bgblue]

Drop ceiling tile hiding places are workable if there is not ceiling insulation piled on top of them, and it is important to respect the weight limit of the tiles. That sort of drop ceiling does not support a lot of weight.

[KentuckyWildcat]

Someday we will need to extend this conversation for me to make a safe room in the basement for the wife and girls.

[CitizenBBN]

Someday we will need to extend this conversation for me to make a safe room in the basement for the wife and girls.

Doable, and I've considered a shelter kind of thing for the basement, mostly for storms and secure storage. The problem in my house will be that it would be a really really bad idea to try to weld anything inside the house or in the basement. one spark and the shelter will be the least of my problems. So anything one builds in that situation must be fabricated in sections then bolted together.

It can be done. I did it to fix some roofing support I needed. But it's more costly and you have to get the measurements just right.

[dan_bgblue]

Someday we will need to extend this conversation for me to make a safe room in the basement for the wife and girls.

If your current basement floor is concrete, and if there is access from your driveway into the basement, via a door or window, we are good to go, and welding and cutting inside the house will not be necessary.

[CitizenBBN]

If your current basement floor is concrete, and if there is access from your driveway into the basement, via a door or window, we are good to go, and welding and cutting inside the house will not be necessary.

Can I make an appointment as well? :)

Getting things into mine will be tricky, old house, but doable.

Now, about this "concrete" floor. What kind of fancy thing is that? (seriously mine is still dirt, but about to be corrected)