Hiding A Spare Key In These Places Could Be A Safety Risk

Hiding a spare key is a common practice for a lot of us. According to Aviva, a British insurance company, about 1 in every 10 people hide a key outdoors when they leave home for an extended period. We can't always be home to let everyone in and need an easy way to let guests and service workers in when we are not around. However, we need to be mindful of where we hide the key to keep our home safe. A lot of the most common places that we might think to leave a key leave us vulnerable to a home invasion. So while you might prepare your home for vacation by locking the doors and setting the alarm, leaving a key in a spot most thieves would check could easily undo your efforts.

"It is really pretty simple to look and find the key. It is easy for the homeowner, but it's also easy for the thieves," security consultant Julius Ulanday told TVH11. "Don't waste time locking your door and putting a deadbolt and doing all this stuff to your door, if you are just going to leave the key outside." Of course, if someone is intent on entering your home, they won't care if they have a key or not.  However, in most cases, you can increase the overall safety of your home by avoiding these hiding spots.

Don't stash your spare key above the door lintel. In general, anywhere that a thief would not even need to leave your front porch for a key to get inside is a bad idea. Picture this: someone wants to get into your home. They checked under the mat and didn't find anything, but they are determined. When you are already on the porch, it's not hard to simply run your hand over the lintel and see if you can feel a key. A sneaky intruder could even disguise checking this spot as a bit of stretch, so no one walking by, or looking on from a doorbell camera, would be any wiser about it.

While some door lintels are tall enough that you might not be able to reach up there without a stool or a ladder, this kind of defeats the purpose of leaving a key there in the first place. What's the point of hiding a key for your dog walker if they can't even get to it?

You should be wary about purchasing one of those "fake rock" key hiding spots that are available at most hardware stores. The problem with these is that while they are a great idea in theory, they still tend to look pretty fake. If your flower beds are lined with rocks, the hiding spot will visually stick out even to the untrained eye. Even if you have rocky flowerbeds instead of mulch, the texture of a fake rock is still usually such that it's easy to tell it apart.

As soon as a thief sees that matte texture, they know exactly where to look to have easy access to your home. It's almost worse if you only have a few rocks in your yard or on the porch. Most intruders will see that and think, "Why is there a random rock just sitting here alone? Oh...that's where the key must be." And they would be correct. You also are unlikely to bring the rock inside with you every time you get home. This could be a safety risk, as the United States Department of Justice estimates that 28% of robberies happen when someone is home and 7% of these break-ins result in violent crime. So leaving a key out in such an obvious place leaves you at risk of bodily harm.

In the daytime, a spare key nestled inside a light fixture on your front porch might seem like the perfect spot. This is especially true if the glass is frosted or opaque, as you can't see through it. However, what happens when you are on vacation and your smart home turns on the front porch light? Everyone passing by will see the perfectly illuminated outline of a key glowing inside the light fixture. UNC Charlotte did a home invasion survey and found that 41% of home invasions are a "spur of the moment" type of event.

Since the same survey found that one in eight burglars used a key to enter the premises they intended to rob, setting up your key as a glowing beacon is not a good way to keep your home safe. Instead, skip using any light fixtures as a hiding spot because even in the daytime, it would still be easy for a potential threat to stick their hand inside and check for a key.

A mailbox is a fairly easy target for an unwelcome person trying to find your spare key. It's sometimes on the edge of your property and generally unattended. It's too big of a safety risk to leave access to your home so unmonitored like this, as it takes very little effort for someone strolling by to simply open the box (which is typically empty) and notice a shiny key inside. However, for those few moments a day when your mailbox is actually full, leaving a spare key inside the box actually leaves you vulnerable to losing your key altogether.

A small key can easily be caught up in a stuffed mailbox and end up being pulled into the mail truck with an outgoing package or get knocked into the gutter in front of your house. Then your key would be even more vulnerable. Even if you purchase a small magnet to store your key inside your mailbox, stealing or tampering with mail is a federal offense per the United States Office of the Law Revision Counsel. This means that you can face serious fines and jail time for messing with people's mail, so it's probably not a good idea to ask your neighbor to go tearing apart your mailbox when they need to water your plants, just in case.

This hiding spot is unfortunately very similar to using a fake stone to hide your key. If someone wants to find your hiding spot, they typically know what to look for. Anything near the door that looks like it moves around a lot is a prime target. This includes a loose brick on your porch or a stone in your walkway. Even if you don't hide anything under it, the wobble of a loose brick is entirely obvious, making it a prime place to check.

This isn't safe as the key could be dislodged or moved around. It's also possible that the key could be warped by the pressure of people standing on the stone above it, rendering it useless. Whether you are leaving a key for your house sitter or your little sister, they won't be able to use it if it's bent or broken, making this option both unsafe and inconvenient.

While this may seem like a creative hiding spot, it's not secure, as it's easy to dislodge the key. Let's say there is a particularly heavy rainstorm while you are away. A steady flow of water could easily push out your key, causing it to lie out in the flowerbed where anyone could take it. In addition, the edges of the gutter or downspout can often be jagged or rusty, making it a safety risk to ask friends or family to stick their hands inside looking for the key.

Should anyone cut themselves on your drainage system, you are at risk of being held liable, particularly if they should develop any sort of infection or something more serious like tetanus from the injury. Because of the risks to both your home's safety and the health of those who use the keys, it is not worth it to place a spare in the gutter or downspout.

You might think a birdhouse is a good hiding spot, but it's still not secure in most cases, as burglars know to check even the most unusual spots. However, if you have a few birdhouses on your property and they are fairly intricate, this spot almost borders on okay. For example, if you have six birdhouses around your property and the key to the back door is inside the one farthest from the house, around the side of the garage, it might be an okay option.

This isn't as obvious of a hiding spot as it's so far away from the back door and would take time and effort to uncover. The safety risk would be having a birdhouse hanging right next to your door and placing a key inside there. Sure, that would make it easier for you to grab when you are in a rush, but the same could be said for a potential intruder.