? give a key to a neighbor I don't know well

[Sunset]

Since OP doesn't know his fairly new neighbors, I can see an alternative, like an electronic lock with special codes and remote opening is probably ideal. '
Add in some $30 cameras (wyze, eufy) and there would be even more security.
Toss in a simplisafe alarm system (with an access code just for the neighbor) and one would know when they entered.

Problems a neighbor with the key can be is: children or someone else the neighbor knows borrow it to steal. They lose the key and it's then floating around somewhere.
Whoever comes in snoops, or plays with the owners gun including children along for the visit

 

[chris2008]

If you hand them the key in a closed envelope its safe for the neighbor too. They could show that they did not use it.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Early Retirement Forum mobile app

 

[jim584672]

Nope. A locksmith can easily pick a lock in an emergency.

 

[RobbieB]

I keep a key in a lock box screwed to the wall in the garage alcove in case I lock myself out. When we travel the dog sitters mind the house and the dogs.

 

[Boose]

OP, your gut is telling you that right now, these are not the neighbors to trust with a key. Go with your gut, while also establishing a relationship with neighbors to see if your gut reaction changes over time (and also, to build community). Maybe they'll never feel right to you, but you could give them a number to call (family, friend, lawyer) who will have a key to get in. I also like the electronic lock idea. But mostly, respect the initial feeling and figure out what feels safer for you.

 

[skipro33]

Get an Apple watch. My neighbor has one. It can tell if he's fallen and call 911 for him. Monitors his heart as well as O2 levels, all sorts of stuff health-wise. If nothing else, one of those emergency button.
Starting in 2023, my insurance now covers these for FREE!
Trust the electronic locks. you can set a bunch of codes that work one time only. Make it your neighbor's last four of his phone number.. He gets to use it once. If he uses it to snoop, it will tell you when he did and it will not work again for him. Amazon actually uses this feature to place packages just inside the customer door to prevent porch pirates.
Just don't wait. My brother's MIL was found on the toilet after 2 days. She said she was too embarrassed to call. She died 2 days later, having lost too much circulation in her legs to have gotten up to call anyone anyways past a few hours. What a way to go, and to be found: molderin' away sittin' on the pot.

 

[Aerides]

My neighbors have our key and we have theirs. We trust each other and it is useful when each of us is out of town. If you live in a place where you can't trust your neighbors, maybe you should consider moving.

That would be great but not viable for us. A quick run down of those neighbors, not a lack of trust, but of knowing.

Recent move ins, young families, small kids, pets - plenty of those, and I would not want the responsibility in exchange.

Flips, remodels, rentals, prepping for move. Everyone close enough to see enough to know something isn't right is in one of these categories.

But I do have family within a half hour, and they are enough for any peace of mind, to go feed the cats or check on me if needed. And while friendly, trustworthy, compatible neighbors would be nice, I have a dozen other reasons not to move for now.

 

[Philliefan33]

Every situation is different, but here is one reason to give a nearby neighbor a way to get into your house:

I serve with the local volunteer fire department. A couple of weeks ago we got a call to assist the ambulance with a forced entry. An old lady who lives alone was ill, was able to call an ambulance, but could not get to the door to unlock it. (We could see her sitting on the sofa). The firefighters busted the front door so the EMTs could get in.

If a neighbor had seen the ambulance and responded with a key, the woman would’ve gotten help earlier and the house would’ve been secured while she was at the hospital. Instead, she goes away with the busted door propped closed and not keeping anyone out. The door needs to be repaired or replaced.

It gets better (worse). This was the second time a forced entry was required for the ambulance to respond for her. ??*

 

[steelyman]

I installed keypad deadbolts this year and am happy with them. They’re programmable which is convenient. I don’t like the idea of having physical keys floating around (there are still a couple that bypass the keypads but they’re in my possession). I didn’t want anything reliant on wi-fi.

 

[CaptTom]

It's interesting to see all the different takes on this.

I'm pretty sure I would have said "great idea!" and exchanged keys. After all, they'd be trusting me to hold their key, too. I don't really see any down side. The chances that they're the kind of people who would want to rummage around in my underwear drawer are pretty slim, compared to all the other bad things which can happen in life.

Far more likely is they have a drug-addicted relative who finds out and sees the opportunity to steal from me. But in that case I'm not sure a locked door would be much of a deterrent. Assuming they know when I'm not home, there are plenty of other ways a desperate person can get in.

A good way to reduce these risks is to simply let it be known that you have security cameras. Even if you don't. It's amazing how the possibility of being seen keeps people honest.

 

[freedomatlast]

We keep a house key hung on the inside wall between the two garage doors in case of an emergency. We have a keypad for garage entry. If necessary, you could give the neighbors the keypad code to get the key to get in, if needed. Afterwards, you could change the keypad code if so inclined.

 

[badatmath]

I love this place, always full of food for thought no matter the topic. Going to look into some of these ideas.

And honestly my house is made of stucco too anyone who wanted could get in if they tried. Locks just keep out honest ones.

Kind of expected everyone to tell me of course give out the key so it is good to know my overly private leanings are not THAT weird.

 

[skyking1]

One neighbor's wife went through a period of drug seeking behavior, and had a key, and carefully went through our house shopping in the cupboards. That was the end of them having a key. I have always trusted him, but her? Not so much. That was the end of others having a key.

 

[street]

Seems like I'm always the unorthodox way or not common way from most folks here.

We have given a key to neighbors and have had them go into the home when we are gone to check on things all the time. We also have a front door locked but have never locked the garage or door coming into home from there. Neighbors are supposed to help each other, and people need to be there for each other IMO.

I could call and have dozens of different people go in my home without hesitation. I see nothing wrong with giving a key to someone a neighbor that you can trust or know well enough to ask them.

If you don't know them that would be a different story.

 

[isisdave]

Businesses everywhere have what is generically called a "Knox box."

You've seen them -- generally a steel box about 4 inches square fastened to the building within sight of the door. They usually have red reflective tape on them for visibility at night.

Inside is a key to your door, and maybe the alarm code if you have an alarm. The fire department has the key to the Knox box. When you order one, you specify which fire department serves you. After you install it, they come out, check that the key inside actually works, and lock it up. About $200 plus installation if you don't DIY.

Ask your fire department what system they use.

 

[yhoomajor]

I would have no problem giving my key to our neighbors. But I would be uncomfortable keeping their keys (because of liability issues, if we don't know them well enough).

Now coming back to folks afraid to give keys to their home to their neighbors. What kind of stuff are you keeping in your house that you are scared so much to be taken by a neighbor? Electronic junk (TV, Fridge, microwave etc)? Furniture? clothes that barely fit me? Most I can think of is computers.. but I doubt they are worth that much to a neighbor to steal.

 

[Sunset]

For all you folks that freely give out the key, here is a little story.

My DINK neighbor was going on a trip, and gave me their key, said to water the plants and I could watch their subscription TV (it was many decades ago). They were well off being DINKs and they had movie subscriptions to the TV.

After they were gone a couple of days, I go over water the plants, and sit down to watch whatever the TV offered. Of course I didn't know how to use it, and so searched for a remote, looked in the TV stand (had doors on it) and there was a stack of sex magazines, NOT tame ones like playboy.
It provided me a view into the kinky nature they must have liked, as there were lots of magazines.

I never looked at them the same way, and never told them what I found

 

[CRLLS]

I wouldn't do this in 2022. Maybe back in the 1960's I would. Frankly, some neighbors are not friend-worthy. This is just one reason I change all locks when moving into a new home. I don't know which neighbor might have a key. One of our neighbors does have our family contact numbers and we, theirs.

If I lived in a very small town, maybe my opinions would be different.

 

[W2R]

I wouldn't do this in 2022. Maybe back in the 1960's I would. Frankly, some neighbors are not friend-worthy. This is just one reason I change all locks when moving into a new home. I don't know which neighbor might have a key.

Exactly! I always change locks when buying a new home. This has turned out to be a blessing, because it gives me a good reason/excuse to immediately install the keypad deadbolts that I love. I have four of them installed, on all four exterior doors. For me, that's part of moving.

My wonderful (late) realtor routinely gave me and his other buyers a printout listing things to do right after buying a home. Changing the locks was front and center, and on moving day he always verbally confirmed with me that I had done that.

 

[jollystomper]

Our approach - we have 2 families in our neighborhood that we know very well, for 25+ years, and both have kids who have grown up with and remain good friends with our kids. We each have known where to find the coded key boxes in case we need to get into our homes. We have only had to have any of them enter once, when we received notification of a fire alarm going off in our home (fortunately a false alarm). We are all discreet types, so I am confident this information has not been shared beyond the adults, and would only be shared with the (now adult) kids if there was an emergency.

We have an alarm system but the neighbors do not know the code. My feeling that if the neighbors need to enter, it is going to be for a situation where we want the alarm to go off for us to be notified.

We also have security cameras at the entrances and inside, and we will get notification if human motion. So we can tell if someone who has access to the key is trying to enter without our knowledge.

As long as you have a method that you are comfortable with, that is all that matters. If we did not feel comfortable with these families we would not give them knowledge of how to find keys to our house, nor would they share with us their information.

 

[pacergal]

What was it about seeing an ambulance that made your neighbor freak out and want a key? Thinking that you fell and could call them to come help?

For me, it would depend on the problem I was trying to solve. We have some neighbors who have been here with us 30+ years and some less than 5. We have a key set hidden, that if there was an emergency and we were away, I could call someone.

If I was going to be gone on a trip for a month or more, I probably would consider giving a neighbor a key, maybe. However, our kids live nearby, so it's not really an issue for that. And when we had a dog, we always had a house/dog sitter stay.

My Dad had one of those key boxes outside his front door for Emergency services. It was placed via suggestion of the Life Alert folks when he got their system. I thought that was a great idea and have considered that in place of our hidden key.

 

[Ian S]

We have great neighbors and the one we are closest to has our key and we have hers. Last week we were out of town visiting family for Thanksgiving. We really don't have a "smart" house and I'm old school in that I set up lights around the house that have timers which hopefully makes the place look lived in. But we do have smart thermostats, a Blink doggie cam and a wi-fi connected garage door opener. Last Tuesday, I received a notification from Blink that my cam had been offline for more than 30 minutes. When I checked the other "smart" items, they were all off-line. It was easy for me to contact my neighbor and ask her to check on the house. Everything appeared to be in order and power was on. I figured it was likely the modem that had hiccuped but decided to wait until we got home to check it out. A simple reboot of the modem was all it took and we may arrange with the neighbor to do a reboot if it happens while we are away at Christmas.

 

[skyking1]

Knox is the company that sells those locks/boxes. I have a knox key switch at our gate.
Here is what I was offered for residential access.
https://www.knoxbox.com/products/residential-knoxboxes/knox-homebox/c-24/c-87/p-7048

 

[Sunset]

We have great neighbors and the one we are closest to has our key and we have hers. Last week we were out of town visiting family for Thanksgiving. We really don't have a "smart" house and I'm old school in that I set up lights around the house that have timers which hopefully makes the place look lived in. But we do have smart thermostats, a Blink doggie cam and a wi-fi connected garage door opener. Last Tuesday, I received a notification from Blink that my cam had been offline for more than 30 minutes. When I checked the other "smart" items, they were all off-line. It was easy for me to contact my neighbor and ask her to check on the house. Everything appeared to be in order and power was on. I figured it was likely the modem that had hiccuped but decided to wait until we got home to check it out. A simple reboot of the modem was all it took and we may arrange with the neighbor to do a reboot if it happens while we are away at Christmas.

Put your modem/router on a timer switch, so that it reboots once per day, at 4am or whatever time you think is quiet. Just have it turn off, and then turn on 3 minutes later.

You could set it up weeks ahead of time, to be sure everything works fine.

 

[skyking1]

That's good, I had 3rd party firmware on a router that would do a scheduled reboot too.