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Security isn’t about luck—it’s about strategy. In this podcast, we break down how to protect your home, family, and business from threats most people don’t even think about. We’re not here to fuel fear—we’re here to help you prepare.
Hosted by security professionals, Michael Johnson, a retired law enforcement captain with 29 years of experience and James Kerr an expert from Boss Security Screens, this podcast delivers real, no-nonsense advice. We know what truly stops burglars—not just locks and alarms, but layered security strategies that keep your home and business safe.
What you'll learn in this podcast:
✅ Why the concept of “layered security” is the only way to protect your property.
✅ Guns for self-defense: myths, reality, and what you really need to consider.
✅ How to build a safe space for yourself and your family while minimizing risk.
✅ Real-life stories of break-ins and assaults - and why some homes remain impregnable.
📢 Subscribe now and stay one step ahead of those who rely on luck.
🛡 Ready to take home security seriously?
Visit https://bosssecurityscreens.com/free-consultation for a free consultation.
it's not fun to come home and find that your house has been broken into the safest neighborhoods have the neighborhood watch have them go buy the house have them stop in at least once a week says "Hey what's going on someone's alarm's going off." Social media is a great way to know where you're at and what you're doing especially if you're the one that likes to post pictures make sure that your vacation doesn't turn into a
nightmare well hey welcome back everyone it's MJ Michael Johnston and uh James Kerr we are here to uh talk to you about uh home security and uh today I think we're going to focus on vacation home security um because we have vacation homes yeah and we're of this vacation home now the the reality is is uh people that have second and third homes uh that do a lot of traveling they're remote it's hard to make sure that you have the appearance of being home when you're really not home and so these bad guys they they like to target those kind of homes and uh I know through my own personal experience uh being a law enforcement officer uh snowbirds uh people who you know travel a lot um when you are gone and you don't have certain things in place uh you leave your home very very vulnerable i know one family that they used to travel six months at a time and they would come back and they found their home had been ransacked and torn through and the and the bad guys actually lived in it for a while yeah they move in you know even worse than that is think about just like leaks and pipes and things like that if you don't have somebody checking on your property you know you could have a lot of damage beyond just any breakins or theft so we want to talk about what are some of those signs let's say your house uh automation system isn't working right or maybe you have the lights coming on at certain times of the day um and they're not working you know a house that's dark every night and there's no foot traffic or vehicular traffic coming to and from it u people are going to quickly realize that that's a vacant home yeah it's pretty easy to recognize it right there's not one telltale thing but we in a blink can kind of discern which home is kind of lived in what's not so it's like vegetation right is the lawn well groomed right has that car always been parked in the same place is the mailbox overflowing exactly the same same lights are on like that front porch line lights been on the entire time and nothing else has been on right parked cars those are one of the easiest because cuz debris always forms around the tires and the cars begin to look like they've been sitting there for a long time and dirty dingy cars so we all kind of recognize intuitively what makes a home look like it isn't lived in uh so this is where we start to talk about our networks if you've got trusted neighbors if you've got family that are close have them go buy the house have them stop in at least once a week and just check on things and make sure that everything's looking good make sure that the automation systems are working the lights are popping on and going off uh make sure that all the alarm systems are operational uh that they are set uh so that you have that deterrent factor uh make sure your camera systems are working right because uh again I think most people nowadays have the remote access and you can check your cameras and if you look at your camera and realize that it's not working you need to call someone to get over there and take a look at your house safest neighborhoods have neighborhood watch where the all the neighbors are kind of pulling together to make sure that the neighborhood see something say something types of thing right so it's interesting when we think about security we often times think about the things we can buy yes or things we can install but it's really a big part of it is you know whom do we know who can help us kind of keep eyes on things or move that car empty that mailbox or test whatever turn another light on whatever to help us accomplish what we want we also have to recognize um the seasonal uh type activities um well a lot of times there's uh certain times of the year where people um like to vacation they like to travel they go visit family so major holidays so snowbirds are going to be leaving when it's cold and miserable and coming back when it's all nice and warm so it's like October to May or June right and we all know here in Vegas people are here uh during the winter time because it's a great place to be it's very temperate and and enjoyable uh but those miserable months in the in the summer you know those are going to be high travel months and people know that you're going to be gone they go north and they go north right and their homes go dark so we do look at the seasonal activity and you need to think about those things as well um you go away for a weekend and you don't think about uh the fact that your house is still left unoccupied right making sure that you call your neighbors right the neighborhood watch uh it's one of probably in my opinion one of the most underutilized and undervalued things that are out there because it is free yeah you know if you can just get a few of your neighbors to work as a network yeah uh whether you get the whole neighborhood or not right if you can just get your neighbors I mean I know all of the neighbors that live around me and we all have each other's phone numbers and we all notify each other if we're going to be gone and so that always makes me feel a little bit better and I've got one neighbor who's just uh keenly aware of what's going on some are more avid than others and uh and I love him for it you know I think it's great that uh you know he'll call me and say "Is everything okay over there?" And I'm like "Yeah yeah we're good." So and uh it's nice to be able to let him know i'm like "Hey I'm going to be out of town for the weekend." You know just keep a quick eye on the place just makes me feel better it is it is really good to have that one neighbor that doesn't minimize stuff many times something will not seem right and we'll kind of in our minds will begin to minimize it like "H it's probably just a broken glass it's the alarm going off is probably just a mistake right?" But having that one neighbor as you mentioned that doesn't minimize it really says "Hey what's going on someone's alarm's going off." It is nice and I'm going to throw out a name here that maybe a lot of you might not even remember but remember the old Glattus Kravitz uh the lady next door in Bewitched that used to always keep track of of the neighbor it's nice to have that neighbor who's out there just watching uh you kind of make uh we make jokes and poke fun at it but uh having that would be nosy neighbor is not a bad thing uh when it comes to security yeah so you've got like the brick and mortar version of that the physical neighbors next to you you go over shake their hand say hello to them or whatever but then you have the digital version which is like Next Door i don't know how much time you spend on Next yeah Next Door is a really good app and there's a lot of stuff out there but Next Door works really well and usually that's the type of post right hey I see something going on here or hope or something happened to me just the other day right so you can see a lot of activity in your neighborhood just through Next Door so do yourself a favor make sure that you put the parameters inside Next Door uh because you don't want to be getting notifications for the entire city um that's true so when you're in your Next Door app make sure that you localize it to you know a half mile or a quarter mile your immediate neighborhood if you don't put some kind of parameter on it you're going to get either the entire city or or maybe maybe half of the city and those notifications are going to be coming in yeah relentless and and then you start ignoring those notifications which is even worse yeah and just quickly a footnote I've noticed there is spam on Next Door right that I don't know about you but there are people reaching out to me and I don't think they exist it's kind of like uh you know those texts you get these days that say "Hey how are you doing?" Right there's no one on the other end of those they're just fishing for something right so on Next Door I've noticed there's kind of a level of noise there just disregard it and and don't think for a moment that the bad guys not looking at your social media yeah they're smart enough to know they're smart enough to know and if they are targeting your home social media is a great way to know where you're at and what you're doing especially if you're the one that likes to post pictures uh in real time hey look at me we're here right okay well if you're there then I know where you're not always think about the strategy of post dating those things and uh make sure you're already home when you start posting these uh photos of your trip and and letting people know that you went somewhere fun cuz uh it's not fun to come home and find that your house has been broken into so uh we we we did talk about the seasonal concerns we talked about uh making sure that you contact your neighbors and and then of course making sure all of your systems are operational but make sure that your vacation doesn't turn into a nightmare uh so when you come home your your stuff is safe and uh you've got a safe place to be when you when you land uh so until next time thank you guys for joining us we appreciate you james this time I'll do this you do the monkey we do the monkey have a great day everyone gorilla the gorilla