If you leave your vacation home or second home unoccupied for extended periods, you could have some uninvited guests if you don't take proper precautions.

In the Tahoe-Truckee resort area of Nevada, a bold gang of burglars used a vacant vacation home as their base of operations to conduct burglaries of other vacant homes in the area.

Colorado's Park and Jefferson counties have been plagued by burglars pilfering mail and breaking into empty second homes in out-of-the way mountain locations.

And in Standish, Maine, after a rash of break-ins, resort area residents took matters into their own hands and formed a special Volunteers in Police Service program to keep an eye on lakeside homes closed for the winter.

Empty second and vacation homes are an easy target for burglars who don't want an audience when they break in. Don't set the stage for a criminal performance.

Before you leave, check that all doors and windows are locked and secured and close window coverings. Do not leave valuables near windows or where they will be easily visible from the outside.

Tell your property manager or a trusted neighbor when you will be away and when you will return. Give them emergency telephone numbers so they can reach you quickly.

Hire or ask your neighbor to shovel the driveway and walkway after it snows or to mow the lawn after the grass grows. Consider forming a Neighborhood Watch group.

Stop newspaper, mail and other delivery services.

Install motion sensor exterior lighting, put interior lighting on a timer. Likewise put a radio or TV on a timer. Tune the radio or TV to a news or talk show station.

Install an alarm system connected to a monitoring service and you may qualify for homeowners insurance discount.

In "Protecting Your Home Away from Home" ThinkGlink.com advises you to be sure you have adequate insurance coverage to pay claims for burglaries.

Be-Safe.Org also offers a learning module "Secure Your Vacation Home" as a step-by-step introduction to vacation home security.

Published: January 30, 2008

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Broderick Perkins parlayed a career in old-school journalism into a contemporary digital news service that really hits home. The award-winning consumer journalist, originally from Wilmington, DE, is founder, publisher and executive editor of the bootstrap DeadlineNews Group, a Silicon Valley-based editorial content and consulting service specializing in residential real estate, consumer news and related editorial consulting services. The DeadlineNews Group includes the website, DeadlineNews.com, offering real estate editorial content and consulting services, and its back shop, the Deadline Newsroom, an open house on news that really hits home. Perkins obtained his formal journalism education from University of Delaware and a journalism boot camp, the Institute of Journalism Education at the University of California-Berkeley. He went on to 20 years of service as a daily newspaper journalist at the Wilmington, DE News Journal and San Jose, CA Mercury News. Perkins covered housing on the San Jose Mercury News reporting team which earned a General News Reporting Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. He has also produced real estate, consumer and small business content for the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, RealtyTimes.com, Nolo.com, Better Homes and Gardens, the National Association of Realtors, Homestore/Move and Intuit/Quicken among more than three dozen publications. In addition to managing the DeadlineNews Group, Perkins most recently served as chief editorial consultant for Nolo's Essential Guide To Buying Your First Home, Nolo, and writes real estate television scripts for RealtyTimes.com.