How to make your house safe when going away on holiday?

[Madissun]

We are going to Queensland for a week over Christmas and there are neighbours near us that i'd really rather didn't know that we are going away. We've caught them before looking over our back fence because our garage door was open and they thought no-one was home .

Does anyone have any ideas on how to make your house still seem "lived in" while you're away? Apart from having someone collect the mail and papers and put the bins in and out?

[Phteven]

You can buy timers at a hardware shop and attach your TV etc to them so that they turn on and off in the evenings and morning.
Leave an old pair of shoes/gardening clogs outside your back door - it makes it look like someone might have kicked them off as they wlked inside.

[Ginger]

can you leave a car in the drive way and get some timer lights to come on for a couple of hours at night. eg. kitchen lights come on from 7pm-9pm.

[Phteven]

When we're home one of our internal lights is on all night (Imran doesn't like it when it's too dark) so when we go away I leave it on.

[squidipa]

make sure someone can take your bins out for you and bring them back in. AND colelct any junk mail or letters. If ya can get someone to pop round every so often. The timers i was gonna say that thats an excelent idea and se an answering machine or forward ya calls. Cancell any milk deliveries too. you can also egt someone to hang out a load of washing and bring them int he next day and then do it again another time.

[Madissun]

Great ideas ladies - thank you!!

I'll definitely get some timers and leave the shoes out. There'll still be 2 cars here as only 1 will be at the airport parking. Putting the washing on the line is an awesome idea too!