My husband and I are renovating his family home in Middle Tennessee with the plans of retiring there in a few years. Got a call from the contractor last night - they went over to finish something and noticed that someone had broken in. This is a tiny little town and my husband is devestated.

Does anyone have a security system? I'd love to hear your experiences. Looks like we might have to go that route.

Security systems are OK if you know their limitations. Home systems are not generally very expensive for the equipment, it's the monthly monitoring that adds up.

Basically they only come into play once a break in has occurred - they dial in to a monitoring center who then either calls you or dispatches the police. Depending on the police department you may have issues if you have excessive false alarms and they may or may not want to have a local key holder that they can contact if there is an alarm.

I think better investment is to check out deterrent measures or possibly a combination of alarm and deterrents. Exterior and interior lighting is huge. New LED and florescent fixtures allow you to light your property up without jacking up your electric bill. Good locks obviously. Trimming or removing shrubbery that could conceal a break in and planting some "prickly shrubbery near and under windows that could be vulnerable are also good measures too.

You can't prevent every thief from getting in, but if you make it a little more difficult, you can put off a good portion of them. Also, the longer it takes them to actually get in, the better chance of them getting caught.

It feels like an extreme violation when this happens, someone stole some change and went through all the stuff in my wife's car just a few days ago when it was parked in our driveway under an arc light. This is the third time in 4 years that this has happened. We usually have the cars locked, but sometimes you just forget.

Thanks, Thomas. I've been robbed before - years and years ago and the feeling was just awful. Someone broke into my sons car parked in front of our house about 10 years ago and stole his CD player and CD's. At first it causes upset - and then anger.

Those are good suggestions. There are retired individuals that live around the house and sit outside a lot. There's a 97 year old woman that lives next door that sits and watches things from her home.

My husband is going to call the insurance agent to get his recommendations. My hubby grew up with this man so they've known each other a very long time.

I use Smith & Wesson and Baretta, but those only work when I'm home

If you do go with a security system, don't go on the cheap. Most, if not all, of the systems use a wireless technology to send the signal. Many of the older models and some of the newer cheaper models are using 2G capabilities, Many of those 2G models have compatibilty issues with the upgraded communications towers so the signals to the secruity service provider are sometimes dropped or not transmitted at all.

I was gonna say...Smith and Wesson...but peeps beat me to it.

(also realizing until they come equipped with remote control and video surveillance, he's not much good unless you're home).

We do have that sort of security - but only when we're there. Funny, my husband also bought a baseball bat to keep down there last weekend. It will go with us tonight.

We have a really nice security system.. it can be armed or disarmed from my phone, and I get notifications when someone arms or disarms it from the console. (Good for if we just have a neighbor check on the dogs, we know when they leave). You have have up to 20 something codes so everyone has their own, and you can fix it so certain codes only work at certain times.

If you have cameras (which we are adding next week because someone shot our dog with a BB gun) you can also watch a live stream on your phone.

My favorite part is that if we are under a tornado warning it beeps very loudly until you get up and acknowledge it. Being in Oklahoma, I slept a little better during tornado season. It will do that for any severe weather advisory. It runs us around $30 a month.

and they're terrible about calling the fire department.

Our camp has been broken into before several times. Thing is, that it is so remote that even if there was an alarm the person who breaks in will be long gone before the police arrive.

We have a local sporting goods store in town that was broken into twice in one week and various handguns were stolen. The individual broke the glass front door and walked right back to the glass display case, smashed it, and was gone in a minute or less. Likely before the alarm company even was able to place the call to the police. While it's impossible to keep this type of thief out, if you can make it more difficult for him to get in and out, you can give the police a fighting chance of catching them in the act or obtain enough evidence to track them down. A simple metal gate in front of the glass door or between the glass door and the display case would have changed that scenario entirely.

Seriously, lighting makes a big difference. I have run countless miles in the dark early morning hours past hundreds of houses. Being in security, sometimes I try to think like a criminal and I can tell you that a well lit property is not attractive when there are 10 other houses that are dark. If I only had $2,000 to spend on securing a house, I would invest in good locks and lighting before I would invest in a security system.

I have a security system that was never really finished..(that's another story), but other than the motion detectors scare one of my big goofy dogs...my dogs are my BEST security (along with a good security light)

2 of them howl, they all have big bad barks and sound extremely intimidating when they all go off at once inside the house!

There are Many Security Systems in TN. ADT is one that come to mine. Since I live in TN, I know that some small towns do not have monitoring companies for the system. If the home is in resort area, they may have the monitoring companies.

No, hgliii - Centerville is not a resort town - and that makes me laugh. They do have to stop lights now on the square - the only ones in town - and they've been added in the last 3-4 years.

I think thomasj is spot-on.

Preventing their break-in initially is a far better idea than dealing with them after they're in.

I know where Centerville is, its near Buzzard's Roost. Columbia should have a monitoring company that could help.

I'll just shoot my way through the flames!

Dogs, lights, and avoiding bushes that block your windows are great security devices. A good Shar Pei will scare off most intruders. Their bark is REALLY loud.

Our shelties are barkers - however we don't live in this house. It's empty most of the time.

I wonder if the person/people that broke in new it was 'unoccupied'... maybe get some timer lights so it looks like someone is living there? Or ask a neighbor to go in every few days and change which lights are on? Just an idea.

Put a security system sign in the front yard. That usually does the trick.

Or, just get a CD of a Rottweiler barking and leave it on repeat while your away.

Or, I like this one, put a sign on the front door that says "There's nothing in here worth dying for."

Unfortunately, in those small towns everybody knows everybody and whose home or not. You might put an action light inside, so if someone went in it would light up. That way a neighbor if there is one close could see inside. Also, you are lucky, over in my neck of E.TN there has been several break-ins like that to cook a little meth.

Some of the owners of unoccupied townhomes near me have asked their neighbors to park in their driveways. Makes it look like someone lives there to outsiders.

When my neighbors go out of town they have some of their interior lights set on timers that mimic their usual activity as well as motion activated exterior lights.

In catalogs I've seen special lights that flicker and change color to mimic a television to give the appearance of someone being home. Those might be a good idea.