Hiding Money and Valuables at Home: Tips and Tricks





I remember my grandmother used to keep three $100 bills in an envelope, and she’d put three marks on the outside, and keep it in a drawer. I never was convinced that was the best way to hide money in your house. But what are the best strategies for hiding valuables in your house, to keep them burglar-safe?

Over at Personal Finance Advice.com , there was an article some months back about the best place to hide money, based on a conversation with a burglar. The article had a few tips I wouldn’t have thought of:

1. Burglars want to get out ASAP, but they’ll generally keep looking till they find something, so the most ingenious hiding place could also result in more of your house being torn up. The burglar suggested hiding your real valuables and cash in a good place, but leaving somewhere more obvious, like in a drawer, $100- $300, so that the burglar gets enough to convince them that’s probably about all there is, and it’s enough to leave feeling like they’ve had not too bad of a haul.

2. Leave in an obvious drawer a fake list of Safety Deposit Box items that includes things like cash, jewelry, deeds, etc. make it appear there isn’t much left that could be in the house.

3. Don’t hide cash inside things that are themselves valuable. The burglar once robbed a house, and found no cash but did take an old stereo. The stereo didn’t work- and a look inside showed why not- it had a big wad of cash stuffed inside it.

Another blog with some tips about where to hide cash at home is Thesimpledollar.com.

They offer some good suggestions, including:

In an envelope taped to the bottom of a kitchen shelf In a watertight plastic bottle or jar in the tank on the back of your toilet In an envelope at the bottom of your child’s toybox In a plastic baggie in the freezer Inside of an old sock in the bottom of your sock drawer In an empty aspirin bottle in the bathroom (bundled up with a rubber band around it) In the pocket of a particular shirt in your closet In a “random” folder in your filing cabinet In an envelope taped to the bottom of your cat’s litter box In an envelope taped to the back of a wall decoration

The burglar from the first blog might well disagree with at least one of the recommendations above: inside a DVD case. Burglars might grab that case, especially if it’s a movie they like.

If you do decide to keep some cash hidden at home, two common tendencies are 1. to keep using it, and not getting around to replace it for a while, and 2. to completely forget about it. So you might want to have a note on the fridge that says $1000 cash is hidden in toilet. Or maybe take a trick from my grandmother and have the note say III toilet.

Happy hiding.

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