What the back garden changes about making a home secure again
The estate plots in Pessac are generally enclosed, planted, and bordered by other gardens rather than by the public road. That layout offers welcome peace and quiet day to day, and exactly the same peace and quiet to anyone forcing French windows at the back. Once the report has been filed and the photographs taken, making the property secure again therefore concerns the forced opening as much as its immediate neighbours: the living room sliding door, the kitchen door, the utility room window, and the door frame that holds them, often more damaged than it looks at first glance.
Areas on the edge of the woods, around Cap de Bos as well as near Toctoucau, add a factor of their own: the far end of a plot backing onto woodland is overlooked by nobody. Securing the front door without dealing with the pedestrian gate at the bottom of the garden, or with the shed where the tools are kept, means leaving in place whatever was used. The owner's own tools, left in a shed closed with nothing but a padlock, are in fact frequently the ones that opened the door.
Rebuilding a key set you no longer have full control over
In a house, the key set that was taken almost never opens a single door. Front door, gate, garage, letterbox, sometimes the cellar or business premises: everything that hung from the same ring has to be treated as compromised, including the spare left in the tray by the front door. Replacement is then approached as a coherent whole, taking the opportunity to remove keys that have become useless and to keep only a known number, written down somewhere.
The rental character of the town adds a further step. In student housing or a furnished let, the landlord has to be told, and it is often the landlord who reports the claim for anything relating to the building itself. In a co-owned building, if entry was made through an entrance hall, a cellar door or a car park, the building managing agent (syndic) must be informed: the weakness then concerns the whole building and not only your home. A detailed invoice is issued to support your insurance claim.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our securing your home after a break-in page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Pessac.