When it comes to prized possessions, heirlooms like jewelry or guns and ammunition, a residential safe might not be the best bet. However, if you’re considering storing family photos wills, birth certificates, important blueprints or other factual documents, a home safe is ideal.
So, the trick to buying a house safe is measuring up the documents to station within it. The regularly available home safes can stack up a foot high mountain of documents.
However, this isn’t the only factor to consider while investing in a home safe. You need to consider the perils that you need to protect your documents from.
Now, typically a residential safe offers protection from 3 kinds of noted perils.
These are:
- Burglary protection
- Water Resistance
- Fire Protection
Burglary protection
In normal circumstances, home safes are not the best target for burglars, who mostly try their luck at commercial safes. However, one can never be too careful. It is very easy to have rivals who might want your hidden documents to bring you down.
So, while picking your residential safe, go for ones like TL-15 rated safe. This one has been tested via torches, tools and mild explosives, and can withstand an attack up to 15 minutes.
Moreover, normal burglars who are in a hurry won’t work to spend excess time on these home safes if they don’t crack. They’ll just likely grab whatever in a hurry and leave.
Water Resistant
When you’re storing vital documents on home safes it is imperative that these come with water-resistant features. Thus, while buying your residential safe, go for one that comes with a ‘verified’ mark. These usually are meeting a manufacture’s standards on being water resistant.
Fire Protection
As per the National Fire Protection Association, an average human faces one in a fourth chance of experiencing home fires in their lifetime. These fires are so potent that they can damage a whole household and burn it to the ground.
Now, this is why a home safe is important as most of these offer fire protection up to an hour. However, depending on the type of content you’ll store there are several options to consider.
- If you’re mostly going to store papers, then pick a safe that doesn’t heat up above 350 degrees on its inside.
- On the other hand, if you’re storing 35mm slides or tape recordings, pick a safe that doesn’t heat up above 150 degrees on its insides.
- Apart from these if you’re storing sensitive data like computer CD’s or DVD’s then choose a safe that doesn’t heat up above 125 degrees.
Well, now that the perils are covered time to consider other facts:
Cost of Safes
A normal residential safe with a range of 1.2 to 1.3 cubic feet is priced within $150 to $300. If you’re looking for added incentives then these safes might be priced higher than $300.
Where to Choose One from?
To choose the best home safe, find a few reputed safe dealers online. Check the credential of these companies and how many types of home safes they offer. Find their average cost and glance over testimonials. Once, a company fits your needs, invest in them to get your house safe.
Well, there you go, now that you know of the perils to overcome, and the buying guide, find the best house safe for your home now.