Do you lock your doors?

My doors are always locked. Living in a city, I couldn’t imagine falling asleep knowing the doors are unlocked.

We live in suburbia… We lock our doors…

Doors are always locked, even during the day when we are home. The alarm system is armed at night and when we are out of the house. People be crazy.

I don’t understand anyone who doesn’t lock their doors. I lock the door to my bathroom even when I’m alone!

My shithole apartment looks just like the eight other floors of shithole apartments. Drunk people try to unlock my door periodically. We had a sex worker going door to door.

I lock the door each time I close it.

Who the fuck doesn't lock their doors? Where the fuck do some of you live, in a cave...with no door?

I would have do some research but I'm pretty sure The Night Stalker had to constantly break into houses. LA in 1985 was not the town from Leave it to Beaver

I live in a suburb in NorCal and the only time I don't lock my doors at night is if I accidentally forgot and passed out. During the day, not so much.

I grew up in an extremely safe working-class suburb with parents who grew up in rural small towns. The doors were always locked, compulsively (well, almost) by them, which in retrospect is a little surprising because of their generation/background. I've lived in cities my entire adult life and am scrupulous about locking, in part because of the environments where I've had my homes and because of parental training. Anyhow, the idea of not locking everything at night is utterly foreign to me. I have a fire escape outside my bedroom window and dislike it despite the incredibly small risk it represents.

Who locks their doors? How could people come and go as they please if you lock your doors? Neighbors can’t just pop in your living room. Friends can’t just come in and make a joke.

R7 The reason why he attacked so many old ladies was because their doors were unlocked. And he also went to quiet areas.

I leave my doors unlocked during the day but lock at night - live in LA but on a fairly quiet street.

Not locking your door (or keeping your windows closed) is one of the most foolish things a person can do. There are thieves and predators out there, and that's exactly the chance they look for: an unlocked or open window.

I don’t bother with it anymore. Just look at it this way. Has anyone ever come in one time during all those years I locked the door? No. Wasted effort.

I lube, I lube, I lube, and not one bloody home invasion!

A hot rich guy breaking into my house, where do I sign up? Do I get a free doorstop to prop open the front door?

I live alone in a quiet, safe suburb and work at home, I also have a loud dog. I'm somewhat paranoid about suffering a stroke or heart attack and having paramedics having to break in if I call 911. I only lock the doors when I'm going out of town.

I do and it's because our family dealt with a genuinely horrific situation. My sister moved into a house on her own and was never that up on locking doors/windows. A deranged neighbor entered her house while she was at work, waited up in the roof all day until she went to sleep and then ... you can guess the rest. Our family never recovered from it. Interestingly, the guy who did it handed himself into police may years later, saying he couldn't live with the guilt.

My sister took her own life 5 years ago.

I generally don't lock my door. I grew up in a very large family in which someone was always at home and usually many people inside, and we never locked our door. I now live in a very quiet neighborhood where many people stay at home every day and my home is just about 5 doors down to two dead end streets that form a Y. . My neighbor across the street looks directly at my front door with no foliage to block her view of it, and my neighbor has a gimongous German shepherd often patrolling the back yard, so I would think a burglar would really think twice before just walking in. However, I always lock it when I'm leaving town. My students have a garage code to get into my house for lessons, and their schedules are also irregular, so it would be very hard for someone casing the joint to guess when the most opportune time would be. However when I lived in NYC of course I locked my apartment in true NY fashion - thumb lock, dead bolt, and chain lock. Occasionally I second guess this system when lying in bed and some sort of creaking or rattling starts up inside the house...... I sometimes think about a rape, but you can't really rape the willing, can you?

Live on the central coast. If i remember i lock my door at night. I’m ok if i forget. I always lock when i leave.

Always locked. I've lived in "quiet, safe" settings in city, town, and country settings but don't like the idea of suddenly hearing someone inside calling my name (or worse, not.)

I grew up in the country, down a long private driveway. It wasn't a setting that encouraged random people arriving at the door, but known friends and family would often enough just turn the door knob, stick a head and foot inside and call out to see if anyone were home. For a short trip into town, the doors were often left unlocked. Some of the people who delivered milk, soda, snacks (I think we had a potato chip and AND a pretzel and licorice man), groceries would open the door and call inside to see if someone were home.

Around the time of the Manson murders, security was tightened a bit and doors were then normally kept locked.

I recall as a young child my mother being on the phone with her sister and I saw a "hobo," an unkempt, beet-faced man walk down the long driveway toward our house. I tried to tell my mother but she wouldn't be interrupted. I moved around the house to see what he was doing and he had his unkindly and grisly face pressed to a back door, then another, then a side door.

I pleaded with my mother but she was pissed off by my (very unusual) interruptions and finally listened only to say, "you made that up." A moment latter, though she put down the phone and I showed her where the man was last, but we soon saw that he was walking away from the house, well down the driveway. She waited to see which way he was going with the intent of driving past him, but he disappeared, into a woods or a ditch maybe.

That incident instilled in me the value of keeping doors locked. I've lived in some bigger houses, one with 8 exterior doors -- too many to have a good sense of which it was even when a contact alarm signalled. No way would I want 8 doors unlocked, or even 1.

Do doors in the US come with a handle on both sides? If not, if it has a knob on the outside, how would anyone simply open the door and get inside?

I live in a highrise condo. We have 24/7 front desk and key fob access control. Not only is the fob necessary to get into the lobby or garage and to activate the elevator, but even then we can only get to our own floor in the elevator (plus lobby of course and all levels of the parking garage).

Our unit doors lock automatically. The only way to set them to an unlocked position is to open the door and press a little button on the side of the door next to the latch-bolt (that thingy that slides in and out of the hole when you open and close the door). That sets the default to "unlocked". Nobody uses that and most don't even know it's there.

People new to the building often lock themselves out when taking out the trash. In the lobby, there's a locked room behind the front desk where we each have a key lockbox where we can store a spare key. This is useful if you lock yourself out, lose your keys, or have a maintenance emergency while you're not home (you can give the lockbox code to maintenance and then change it later if you want).

I lock my doors. I take precautions against surprise anal. I even sleep fully douched and lubed. You never know.

My front door has a Yale lock that locks automatically on closing. I've never known anything different, so I think they're pretty much standard here in the U.K.

My back doors (one stable door and some French windows) both have double locks to secure them and I leave them that way whether I'm home or not.

I lock my doors because I don't own a sword

[quote]My front door has a Yale lock that locks automatically on closing. I've never known anything different, so I think they're pretty much standard here in the U.K.

Absolutely standard, R25. The bit of hardware known generically as the "Yale Lock Surround" was a stable of council estates for years but now has worked its way up in society or at least ubiquity, like the Beckhams.

The first example shows a council estate door, no knob, no pull, just that nasty little edge of brushed aluminum to grab with fingers greasy from crisps and kebab.

The second example shows a more well-heeled Georgian style door with six fielded panels fitted out with lion-head knocker, a centrally mounted octagonal pull, a doorbell ringer button, and a rather vestigal skeleton keyhole capped with an oval escutcheon, all in antiqued brass by a mid-level hardware supplier. But the business bit of opening the door is all about the Yale Lock Surround.

With the Yale Lock Surround, the key becomes a sort of bring-your-own door knob or door pull.

Door knobs are fairly uncommon in exterior doors for Spanish domestic architecture, too, but never that little lip of metal as a surround. Instead, it's just the lock with a simple circular surround and a pull handle, often in the form of a polished brass turning with two supports that join it to a backplate -- think 19thC furniture pull.

The Yale

We live in the country. Our doors are unlocked. We also have two big dogs.

We used to lock the front door, but realized it’s silly… it only deterred robbers so lazy that they didn’t try the back.

Very little crime around here. No we have huge windows in much of the first floor, so if they want to get in, they will. Best they do it without breaking our windows.

I'm 52 yo. door is unlocked at all times, me presenting hole in the entryway

As far as I can tell, there's never been a break in or theft in my immediate neighborhood -- I live a couple hundred yards from a police station. I still lock my doors. I even make sure to close my garage door if I'm working in the backyard.

One of my neighbors told me he never locks his doors -- but he has a very imposing-looking and sounding German Shepherd (though the dog is actually quite friendly) and I get the sense he'd welcome an opportunity to shoot someone trying to break in.

r30 address of said friend please ? (asking for a friend)

Yes and I have a security camera. Some guy came to my apt trying to sell me a Bible at 1:30 in the morning. This was years ago. I never forgot that though.

Are you kidding? I put up a privacy fence across the front of my property (with my own two grubby paws) and a farm gate in front of my driveway. I have two No Trespassing signs and two that tell you you're currently on camera. I have three cameras, although the only one that's constantly recording is the one that has a solar charger. That shows everything from my driveway gate up the street for about 100 ft.

I live on a dead-end street and if you're back here, you better be here to see me or my evil fuck of a neighbor across the street.

BTW, I'm not being paranoid. Two neighbors have physically threatened me; one said that one morning I would wake up "with two barrels in [my] mouth." The other is still livid that he was tased and arrested 5 years ago after he created a drunken scene with the police that I'd called on him for his loud music at 2AM (there's much more to that story, like him running down the street screaming about me being a lesbian, repeatedly telling me to get off "his" street and "go back where I came from" ?? etc.). My across-the-street neighbor (Mr. 2-Barrels referenced above) hates me because he shoots guns out over the swamp "just for fun" (and there's a free public firing range 5 miles away!) and sets bonfires two stories tall (in a yard full of dry pines) and I told him I was going to call the fire department. I believe (but cannot prove) that he broke my truck windshield and one of my motorcycle's turn signals, which precipitated me buying the cameras.

And I have two pistols, one by my bed and one by my recliner in the living room. And an adorable little dog who may or may not bark at an intruder in the middle of the night.

And this doesn't even take into account the random junkies and bums that wander the neighborhood, like "Pill Bill," who lives in a shell of an abandoned trailer and is probably brain-damaged from shooting meth every day. Or maybe he was brain-damaged before -- hard to tell. And the trailer a few blocks away that blew up from people cooking meth, and the one around the corner that got burned down three times by angry junkies because the owner didn't want them coming around to visit/shoot dope there anymore. I could go on...

But since you asked, yes -- I lock my doors.

The one and only time I left the front door unlocked, the non-verbal autistic kid from next door walked in and started rifling through the house. It’s like he knew, and that’s creepy.

Now it’s always locked.

R33 But the GOP told me all crime is caused by blacks in cities. Your story is specious.

Does anyone have anything good to say about Florida? It can't be all bad, surely? Every post on here from people who live there or have visited, make it sound like a shitty hellscape with no redeeming qualities.

Lock the Doors TIGHT

Are you Amish, OP?

Gated community, security is 24/7, armed response. But yes, 50/50 on lockup.

I can't imagine not locking my doors.

I lock my doors if I leave my apartment to go down and get mail and come right back up.

R36, there's a lot to love about Florida. Even where I live, in the Ocala National Forest, it's beautiful, and if you like to see wildlife (including bears, deer, armadillos, hawks, cranes, herons, egrets, bald eagles, and so on), it's a great area for camping and kayaking and there are lots of fresh water springs open for swimming.

I rode my motorcycle through the Everglades some 20 years ago and accidentally got lost in the sugar cane fields when they were burning off the cane. Awe-inspiring to see the tall cane burning, filling the air with the sweet smell and the taste of its sugar. I'll never forget it.

Where I lived in St. Pete (NE) was gorgeous as well, if you can ignore the traffic. I always maintained that St. Pete (where my father currently lives) has the best weather in all of Florida. I lived a few blocks from Tampa Bay (on the poor side of the rich neighborhood) and the views across the Bay were incredible. Look up the area around the Vinoy Hotel if you're curious.

The beach in Boca Raton is the best I've seen in this country, with crystal clear water and burning white sand; Siesta Key (Sarasota) is also very nice and often wins awards. You can see otters and manatees in places like Weeki Wachee. And the ride/drive over the Keys down to Key West, with water on both sides of the two lane bridge, is breathtaking.

I could go on forever, but the bottom line is this: Florida itself is very nice; it's the people who live here who make it a nightmare. I often say that I'd love where I live, if the people here would all drop dead.

Thank you, R41, I appreciate you taking the time to write that.

I'm sorry, R42 (Jaguar), I'm R33. I was R81 on another thread.

Interesting - I assumed more people left door unlocked. Even in rural areas, you guys lock the doors? Guess it is smart.

Hell, yeah. Too many random weirdos out there, casing places.

Always. Unless I'm just running out to the car and coming right back in or something. I'll leave main front door open and the storm door closed since it provides another window and more light, but I'll lock the storm door. Mid-size city - no huge crime problem, but stuff does happen from time to time - mainly people trying to break into cars, and VERY occasionally homes.

I lock them whether or not I'm home during the day, and lock them at night - absolutely. The world is full of crazies and I deal enough with them during the day at work.

Fayetteville is a college town and most likely our dear drunk tyson ended up in a dorm like apartment where 3-4 roommates are perpetually losing their keys, etc. so why bother locking up. The other Faye related issue: We are truly a party town where cops routinely look the other way. If young tyson would have quickly got out of bed, apologized, didn't't fuss--none of this would have been revealed. I suspect he went into asshole mode so they had no choice but to arrest him. The Waltons, Tyson, Hunt families own and run this section of the country.

I live in DC, you bet your sweet life I lock my door. But I grew up in Maine, in an old house where the front door lock literally hadn’t worked in at least 50 years….

[quote]Does anyone have anything good to say about Florida? It can't be all bad, surely? Every post on here from people who live there or have visited, make it sound like a shitty hellscape with no redeeming qualities.

Florida, it is truly the rancid fetid crotch and unwashed armpit of the US. Look at who just got re-elected governor.

It seems so many who live there are from other states, they couldn't make it in their states. Others moved there due to the tax laws.

I have a few NYC and New Jersey relatives who moved there about 25 years ago, the were always trashy, they fit right in. Of course, they own guns. No, they don't hunt. These East Cost hillbillies love living there.

Florida can be wonderful for vacation.

R41 BOTH of your posts brought back such memories for me ! Fellow Floridian here ,as well as a former trailer park dweller ! I could picture both your post so vividly . Im convinced all the changes of the last 30 years is directly related to the huge influx of northerners. There used to be a Season in Florida,then the yankees would go home.Now the Season never ends,and they stay. With all their bigotry and ignorance. I think its only 32% of Floridians are native born now. People dont believe me when I tell them how nice it was here growing up in the 60s and 70s. Florida was still very southern then. It all started changing when they built Disney. I remember driving along A1A and there not being a house for miles. I remember St. Augustine being a charming,slightly run down town with weird and funky people everywhere. Now its god awful choked with tourists. I miss the Old Florida vibe,but its never coming back .

Florida -- all of it -- smells like rotting vegetation and FARTS

Growing up in the 70s, in a quiet, almost rural section of a suburb, we actually didn't lock the doors. Now, that area has been developed, but even if it hadn't been, if I lived there I would lock the doors, in 2022. And I do, where I now live.

R53 That’s the appeal!

Sometimes….lI live on a mountain with one neighbor and a church….it’s would be easier for a serial killer to find victims closer to town

So who attends that church? Do people climb up that mountain you live on for the church services? I don't worry about a serial killer. You sound like a serial killer! I'd avoid cooking near your house.

R24 Cracked up at your response.

I have two large dogs and high walls/gates around my property, as well as a double alarm system, razor wire, and an electric fence. Sounds excessive, but I have a lot to protect. My doors are always automatically locked; in fact, I have to have my keys with me every time I go outside because if the door happens to close, I won't be able to get back in. This happened once a few years ago when one of my dogs jumped up and knocked the door closed when I went out to pick up a package at the gate; I was locked out for about three hours, feeling stupid, until my husband came home and luckily had his keys.

If you do not lock up you deserve whatever crime might find it’s way inside.

I only lock them when I leave or before I go to sleep.

R19 True New Yorker style also means that iron pole angled up against the door.

R61 This:

Grew up in rural New Zealand. Live in Central London. Doors always locked in both places. Why wouldn’t you? You’re tempting fate if you don’t and visitors can can knock.

Yes, for many reasons - here is one: Circa 1960 Norfolk my mom was a young wife and my dad was out to sea. Mom was washing dishes. There was a window above the sink. She looked up and there was a man on the other side of the window watching her.

My neighborhood is sleepy and I feel safe in it, but I'm also a 5'2" woman who could be physically overpowered by a strong fourth grader. My doors are kept locked even though the dog loudly alerts us to anyone sneezing within a two-mile radius of our house.

Always at night, always when away, not during the day when home. I have a large property several thousand feet off of the road surrounded by woods that’s got an eight-foot fence around all of it with a gate. The gate I keep open most of the time because I’m scared the house will catch fire and a gate will slow down the fire truck. I have several cameras on the gate, drive, and house.

Another security thing we’ve done is bought these little motion sensors you can place around outside to tell a base unit in my kitchen when something walks through a gate, or down a path, etc. I’m able to hear when delivery trucks are coming through the gate, when deer are walking in or out, when someone goes snooping around in my farm buildings. I like having notice that someone is coming down the very long driveway, particularly.

Yes and turn my home security to home mode.

Everyone locks their doors. After all, this is America.

The only time I forgot in the last couple years: I left the car doors unlocked overnight and someone stole my jumper cables.

I was dumb in my youth and there were a few nights when I was drunk or exhausted that I left my apartment keys on the outside of my door in the lock. It’s a miracle I’m still alive.

R64's story gave me a chill.

The paranoia here is weird. 8 foot high walls? Double alarms? Do you people live in Rio or someplace? Or just watch too much Fox News. Suburban Northeast - if I forget to lock my door, I don’t worry about it. There is maybe one crime a year in the town. I get if you live in a single family in a dangerous city - but 90% of people worry about this?

Why the hell wouldn't you lock your door? It takes seconds.

Agree with R72 AND R73, actually. Some of this seems like a lot--reminds me of South African-style panic room setups. (Seriously, sounds like a scary situation in that country.)

I definitely do... But if I lived around that Tyson dude... I may just consider keeping my door unlocked.

At night and when I leave the house.

I have security screen doors and they are always locked. There have been far too many creepy people to knock at my door for me to ever feel comfortable leaving them unlocked. I don't answer the door anymore, either. If you are someone I want to see, you're going to have to call or text before dropping by.

over 1/2 mile from nearest neighbor, in the woods, two dogs, and easy to miss drive.

not so much.

“I open the door and shout, ‘BOYS, MOMMA’S MUSSY NEEDS YOU PLOWING!’”

Yes, always. My parents never locked the door of our family home and I thought that was insane. Even in the safest areas there are occasionally burglars and other intruders. At least make them spend some time and noise getting in.

Always and lock the front screen door too.

wth is the person with razor wire protecting? their sex slaves?

What a bunch of paranoid pansies you all are. Who cares if you lock your door or not? Why worry about it? Do you worry about if you’re going to die in a plane crash too?

Screen doors are locked allowing a breeze to blow thru. Windows are always open but secured in place with locks.

Thanks for making my job so easy, r83!

R83 I've been burgled in the past. Not to mention reading stories like that of Alesha MacPhail where a boy crept into an unlocked house at 2am when everyone was asleep and abducted a 6 yr old to rape and kill. It does happen so it's better to make it harder for the criminals.

You think people can’t just cut a screen door?

R87 Of course but criminals look for the easiest option.

Security screens, my friends.

Is it a badge of honour for some to say they don't lock the doors and you are a pansy if you do?

R90 I'd say fraidy-cat instead but yes that's the gist of it. Walking around afraid of your own shadow.

Yeah, some people are pussies. What’s the worst that could happen?

R57 it’s a tiny Baptist church and when they have services there might be 7-8 cars there…less for Wednesday nite bible study. …more are in the cemetery out in the back of it than attend the place. The road itself is very narrow and curvy…I don’t drive it at night…if someone wants to break into a home, there are plenty that are much easier to get to down the mountain, in the town itself I think a wandering cow from the farm next door would come here before a criminal

My doors are locked all the time, but there have been a couple of times where I forgot to lock the sliding glass patio door and it has then been left that way for a couple of days.

Amazing how the endless news stories of crime incites paranoia. The idea that you are LIKELY to be robbed if you leave your door unlocked is paranoid. Statistically it doesn’t make sense. So why do people truly fear it? “News” which has learned that people love stories about crime - so it keeps feeding them to us. The cycle of fear is a sick element of modern life.

Yes - better to lock door. But statistically in most of America, your chances of dying in a car accident are higher. So why do you people get in a car and drive? Shocking how distorted our sense of threats have become.

I live in a major city. Yes, I lock my doors. Always. Even when I'm home.

ALL homicides in the US totaled about 25,000 in 2020..

All vehicular deaths totaled about 39,000.

R95 I get in a car to drive despite the risks because going places enriches my life. Not locking my doors doesn't add any value to my life. Please explain to me all of the great benefits of going to bed with your door left unlocked.

R87, burglar would need to carry a blow torch for mine. They are solid metal, handmaid...not those light aluminium anti mosquito screens. Make 'em strong to last.

I grew up in a place where 10ft walls and security guards were the norm. Now I live in rural MA and even keep a door open in summer. Bliss.

There are rampant car thefts. Most stolen cars were left unlocked. I think owners deserve to have their vehicles stolen if they’re too stupid and lazy to lock up.

I’d leave my doors unlocked if I knew he’d come sleep in my bed. Of course he’d have to be cool with waking up to a surprise blowjob

R100 South Africa?

Why in the fuck are you so interested? Planning to knock over my house??

Why is South Africa so dangerous that people need ten foot tall walls?

R105, my understanding is that home invasion is a way of life there. Gated communities have comically (to Americans) large security forces, crazy walls and surveillance, and houses with panic rooms are very common.

Do they have lions there that leap tall walls?

Yes, we have a sliding glass door off the deck. I do keep it open at night in summer, as we don’t have air conditioning on our main floor. We lock the front door, but I have been known to forget. No one comes to our door, other than delivery people and the occasional salesperson. In 27 years here, I have only had one person try the door. It was locked and I didn’t feel like answering.

R107 If a bunch of Chinese or whatever people swooped onto your land and country while you stayed dirt poor, would you still be sneering and mocking?

I used to live in a block of units where my closest neighbor lived with her front door always open and the screen door unlocked. She had a walking disability so I assume she wanted to have easy access if there was a problem plus she had her meals delivered. This was fine except that she also blasted her TV so the noise travelled into the hallway and my unit. She was also the type to fill the entire hallway with potted plants. Glad I moved away.

[quote] [R107] If a bunch of Chinese or whatever people swooped onto your land and country while you stayed dirt poor, would you still be sneering and mocking?

So you’re saying it’s okay for them to rob white people.

R111 Nope, but they really think that there are no consequences? That it's just 'lions' i.e. paranoia.

You’re like Hasan. Why not just let them loot and steal?

[quote]Do you people live in Rio or someplace?

Nope, but we did live near a "work farm" when I was a kid, so everyone locked their doors, despite it being a rural township.

My friend's mom found escapees hiding in her barn a couple times. She set food out for them and locked the doors. Pretty ballsy of her, staying there with her 2 daughters while ex cons hid out in her barn.

I live in a major city now and there's no way I'd leave the door unlocked, with all the weirdos who go door to door here. Some just want to sell us solar panels and others want to know if we've found Jesus, but there are also porch pirates and other sketchy types who make regular appearances.

Instead of locking your doors why don’t you just move?

R115 I would lock my doors anywhere I moved to. Basic security. Even if it's safe rural area, people still get deliveries. There are still people who look for opportunities.

Absolutely. I live in a town of about 4,000 people, moved recently from a large city. This place is kind of "Wild West" and people are not afraid to get in your face to intimidate. Crimes do happen here & sometimes you're not sure what's really going on, like if you're about to be a part of some scheme or something. Or who you may have rubbed the wrong way, even if you don't know it.

Older couple a few houses down had work done on their house a few years ago by some local guy & the work was shitty or some other dispute (can't remember what exactly). It became a big thing where they publicly called the guy out online for not calling them back, leaving stuff unfinished etc. Well, guy's brother got pissed, went over to the couple's house one evening, walked right in the back door in a wolf mask and beat the shit out of them.

Heck yes I keep my doors locked at all times.

Growing up in the 60s in Fl it was nothing for us to go to bed with the doors and windows wide open and just the screen doors latched. We didnt have air conditioning ,many people didnt then. I also remember mom putting chunks of dry ice in a big aluminum washtub with a fan blowing over it.Worked surprisingly well,if you slept right in front of it. When I lived in apartments above the 2nd floor I always left the windows open at night if weather permitted. I miss the smell of fresh air and the singing of frogs and crickets. It was a nice world,but its long gone. No way in hell would I ever leave a door unlocked or windows open at night in this day and age.

I lock them at night but if I forget, I don't worry. No one would get past my dog.