cash

[jebmke]

Just to be clear, there are no fire PROOF safes.... just fire resistent.... they give a rating on what kind of fire they can protect against.... such and such temp for such and such of time....


Here is an example...

ETL Verified 1/2-hour fire protection for CDs, DVDs, USB drives and memory sticks up to 1550°F

yes, my use of the term fireproof was incorrect and the example was meant to clarify that whatever the claims that the safe manufacturers make, house fires are damn hot and a safe is unlikely to be much good.

 

[NW-Bound]

This year I had an experience at a hotel with the in room safe. My valuables were locked up and the safe battery went dead. I was unable to open the safe. The maintenance lady took about 20 seconds with a philips screwdriver and a hex socket to open the safe.

Next time I am in a hotel room with a safe, I will examine it more closely. From the above story, the hotel safe sounds like a placebo to me!

And talk about hotel rooms, I recently saw on the Web how one brand of hotel room electronic locks, the type with a card reader, could be opened through an auxiliary port that a hacker can access easily, using an electronic device small enough to be built into a marker pen.

Hacking Hotel Locks in Seconds With Cheap Tools - YouTube

 

[Lazarus]

Fear is the most important factor in ER. Get over it!

 

[LOL!]

Wouldn't it be better to spend a few bucks so that you could harvest your own food?

That might mean trees that provide nourishment (oranges, pecans, mulberries, apples, pears, etc), edible landscaping, and a garden for other stuff. Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

 

[Purron]

Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

 

[kyounge1956]

Wouldn't it be better to spend a few bucks so that you could harvest your own food?

That might mean trees that provide nourishment (oranges, pecans, mulberries, apples, pears, etc), edible landscaping, and a garden for other stuff. Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

Plus maybe a small quantity of "junk" silver dimes, just in case.

 

[NW-Bound]

...some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

Everything tastes like chicken anyway. We are in a Matrix!

matrix hyperreality - YouTube

 

[marko]

I've thought about it but the risk is too great. This year I had an experience at a hotel with the in room safe. My valuables were locked up and the safe battery went dead. I was unable to open the safe. The maintenance lady took about 20 seconds with a philips screwdriver and a hex socket to open the safe. Your never as safe as you think you are.

When we travel, the night before we leave the hotel, we leave the safe open (after we're in for the night) just in case something like this happens. Last thing you want is to be ready to go and have your passport etc stuck in a room safe. Might be hard to find that maintenance lady at 5AM if you've got an early flight.

 

[martyb]

Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

+1

 

[brewer12345]

Wouldn't it be better to spend a few bucks so that you could harvest your own food?

That might mean trees that provide nourishment (oranges, pecans, mulberries, apples, pears, etc), edible landscaping, and a garden for other stuff. Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

Fox squirrels are quite tasty and in fact are DD's favorite food (but they are a right bitch to skin). If I could figure out how to do so without DW being the wiser, I would regularly be harvesting the ones in my backyard.

 

[Helios]

Ha! Way back when I was a boy scout camp counselor we would skin squirrels. Easiest method is called case skinning, should be able to find how on net. Cook em way slow or they taste like rubber!

 

[winger]

We've kept around $1000 cash at home since Y2K. No disasters, but it has come in handy a few times.

 

[brewer12345]

Ha! Way back when I was a boy scout camp counselor we would skin squirrels. Easiest method is called case skinning, should be able to find how on net. Cook em way slow or they taste like rubber!

They are much more time consuming than rabbits.

I find the best way to cook most small game is moist heat over time. Next up I will be trying squirrel pot pie.

 

[haha]

Sounds like prepper thinking, and if you want tangible valuables to hold onto, why not keep some precious metals around the house? At least if your house does burn down, there's a chance you might be able to recover them.

I try to use credit cards for everything (balance paid off each month), so I keep as little cash around as possible.

I'm guessing that a prepper is different from a preppie?

Ha

 

[devans0]

My home town was flooded in 08. I was able to evacuate but two banks and three credit unions that I used were flooded, ATM's were down. We only got by with a single credit card until a branch credit union was able to open and we could access our money. The last account to get opened was the safety deposit box after 18 months.

I keep cash in my house, but I won't use a safe for any more than chump change. (As my neighbor can attest, it was a burglar magnet.) The age old method of a hole in the ground is hard to improve upon. In my case, I keep some emergency money in a hole in my basement. I use a waterproof case (Pelican) that's buried deep enough to be a great heat sink and covered with concrete. I can get to it any time, any day in less time than it takes to drive to a bank or wait in the line at the bank.
I keep only enough to get by in an emergency but the peace of mind of the 'stash' is worth the inflationary losses. You never know when say your four dogs get poisoned, your neighbor meets an unfortunate accident and you need to take a quick extended vacation.

 

[obgyn65]

No. I don't even have a safe.

Anybody consider taking, say $40-50k (or other substantial amount) out of your savings account and just sticking it in your home safe?

 

[donheff]

I have important documents (titles, passports,...) in an unlocked fireproof safe in the basement. My hope was that a burgler would look at the junk toss it all out on the floor and ignore it. I didn't count on the fireproof bit being a misnomer. I figure if I put it in a bank vault we will get hit with a nuke or something -- but, then, what will I care?

 

[devans0]

The rest of the story.

I mentioned the money-in-the-mattress solution for keeping money safe. A crackpot lead in like that deserves to have the whole story told.
I used to have a large safe in my basement. It was a thing of beauty, made in 1800's with ornate pre-Victorian bas reliefs and bands of steel that would thwart any attempts to open it. When my home was flooded, the safe mechanisms seized, making it a square steel 'boulder' in the basement.
I called for estimates. It was cheaper to buy another safe than to open this one, and had estimates to haul it away that were several grand, assuming that I first moved it out of the basement to a place that a crane could lift it to a truck. $$$$$!!!
I spent a few hours with a drill and cutting wheel to open a small hole through the first steel layer to the fireproof powder/cement layer, and a few hours trying to move it a few feet. Clearly, none of these would work. I did, however, learn how Stonehenge boulders were moved by a DIYer in England using a rock to balance the boulder and it being swiveled (walked) inch by inch, and that fire resistant ratings come from the number of inches of drywall and concrete that is in the walls.
What eventually happened was the basement floor was jack hammered out, I poured new footings to support my house, a big hole was dug in the floor, the safe was pushed in, then refilled the hole and the floor was re-poured. Except for the hole, this was work that I had to do anyway.

I still had that small child inside that liked cubbyholes to hide my treasures, and not wanting to spend another few grand to have a new safe moved in, incorporated my hidden cache under my new floor. I guess that after I lost three banks and credit unions, I became that depression-era crank that doesn't trust banks. Mutual funds ARE safe tho

 

[Meadbh]

What eventually happened was the basement floor was jack hammered out, I poured new footings to support my house, a big hole was dug in the floor, the safe was pushed in, then refilled the hole and the floor was re-poured. Except for the hole, this was work that I had to do anyway.

A few centuries from now, an archaeologist will discover this and will write a PhD thesis about the habits of the devans0s!

 

[Bikerdude]

There's not enough room in my safe for that amount of cash. The rice, beans and ammo take up too much room.

 

[dessert]

Right here in town there was a murder of a man, his wife, and their son. Since this town is like "Mayberry", there was disbelief and confusion as to why this had happened. As it turns out, there were three men that committed the crime and hauled out a safe from the home that was said to contain "gold coins". The safe was found demolished but unopened in a ditch right out of town. Bottom line was three murdered, and three now in the justice system, all due to a rumor about what was in the safe.
Sad part is that the safe held no coins at all.
Anyway, this story came to mind with this thread. I would not recommend 50K hanging around the house.

 

[GSMAN]

Get Ready!!

Wouldn't it be better to spend a few bucks so that you could harvest your own food?

That might mean trees that provide nourishment (oranges, pecans, mulberries, apples, pears, etc), edible landscaping, and a garden for other stuff. Then some local animals like squirrels, pigeons, cats, and fish or whatever that you could catch and eat.

This makes the most sense to me. I bought a small track of land that has a creek flowing through it, lots of tasty critters, and plenty of wood for burning. Although I hope I never have to use it to survive, I could probably survive for a little while. Anywho, getting back to the original question, keeping a few thousand bucks for an emergency around the house is a good move. If I had $50k laying around my house, I would never leave my house!! I am way too paranoid. I don't like keeping more than a hundred bucks in my wallet! I don't want the boogey man to hurt me or take my money. Yeah, I am paranoid.