Irrespective where you’ve parked your car, whether in your garage, the street outside your house or even in a public parking lot, an anti-theft device installed in your car is the surest way to ensure it’s safe from thieves and burglars.
In the US alone, a car is reported stolen every 25 seconds. The figures would be mind-boggling if we took into consideration the number of vehicles being broken into.
Installing your car with an anti-theft device is one way of deterring thieves from stealing or breaking into your car, but not a panacea to your security. In other words, you’ve made thieves sweat when committing their heinous act. The best it can do is buy you some time before help comes calling. Depending on the car type and valuables inside your car, determined professional car thieves and burglars will always attempt to steal or break into the car.
This now brings us to the issue of your car’s safety system – how difficult is it to tamper with the car safety system and succeed? There are many different anti-theft devices in the market and none is absolute. Nonetheless, the following tips can help you identify a good anti-theft device.
- If the car alarm was to go off whether falsely or otherwise, it should be loud and irritable enough for people around to take notice
- Have a caretaker system or cellular alarms that immediately puts law enforcers on the alert
- Shop for a heavy gauge steering wheel lock or tire locks
- Trigger off indicator lights or window stickers
But this is no enough, determined car thieves will always cart your car and the valuables inside away. A good car safety system should come with other theft-prevention measures such as shut of certain steering immobilizers, locks steering wheel covers, locks steering-wheel bars, kill switches, fuel-system locks, have tracking devices and triggers delay systems. For superior safety measure, you must deploy remote start alarms that high tech gadgets. For those with deep pockets, you can go for alarms that have GPS tracking, where tracking of your car can be tracked in any corner of the earth.
In addition, one can combine the above with good judgment and some common sense to thwart the thieves. For instance, you should not leave your car at unattended for an extended period in a public parking lot or in the street. If you are parking in a attended parking lot, desist from leaving your car keys behind, you never know who can get hold of them. If you must surrender the car keys, to the parking attendants, never attach a tag indicating the car registration. During the night, insist on parking your car in well-lit areas with many people milling around. After parking ensure that the car wheels are turned sharply toward the curb.
