How to Reduce Crime in Your Apartment Community
Ever since the emergence of Covid-19, the multifamily industry was quickly thrusted into one of its most challenging times, facing quarantines, locks-downs, and tenants unable to meet rent.
All of these factors lead up to the increase in criminal activities in apartment communities such as catalytic converter thefts, break-ins, trespassing, theft, robberies, and illegal dumping.
If criminal activity is high in your community, your ability to retain or get new tenants become much more difficult.
What can apartment communities do to reduce crime and protect their tenants?
Here are 5 simple, but effective practices that can help reduce crime in your apartment community.
- Screen all your tenants and prospects
It is important to begin weeding out the bad tenants and preventing future unwanted tenants from planting themselves in your community. While this, may not be “simple”, it is a necessary step to reduce crime.
It is also critical to check the prospect’s rental history, criminal background, and credit worthiness.
- Call your local law enforcement for help and join the crime free/crime prevention program.
Many police departments offer crime-free/crime prevention programs that are designed to reduce crime and other unwanted activities in the multifamily industry.
- Use Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design Principals
The purpose of CPTED is to reduce criminal opportunities through modification of physical features in the community, while giving the community peace of mind and improving the quality of life.
Here are 4 concepts of CPTED to that can help your community.
Natural Surveillance – The placement of physical features, activities and people in a way that maximizes visibility.
Natural Access Control – The physical guidance of people coming and going from a space by the strategic placement of entrances, exits, fencing, landscaping, and lighting.
Territorial Reinforcement – The use of physical attributes that express ownership, such as fences, pavement treatments, art, signage and lighting.
Maintenance – Allows for the continued use of a space for its intended purpose. Serves as an additional expression of ownership, prevents reduction of visibility from landscaping overgrowth and obstructed or inoperative lighting.
- Implement more access control in your community
By increasing access control, this will make it more difficult for unwanted guests to be able to enter the community. While not every environment can be enclosed, this will add an extra element of safety for tenants.
- Deterrence and Video Security at your Entrance Gates
Apartment communities that have great tenants unfortunately, can still be plagued by criminal activities.
A majority of criminal activities in apartment communities are caused by unwanted guests from the outside.
At every apartment community, we recommend having something that is visually obvious that displays security presence as this can greatly deter criminals from targeting the property. Paired with video surveillance and license plate recognition, any vehicles entering the community will have their vehicle information captured. In the event a criminal event happens, the vehicle information of the suspect can be found for police investigations.
Video Surveillance in your apartment community can help reduce risk and mitigate losses, all while giving your tenants and residents an improved peace of mind, by increasing the safety and security of your community.
For more information about our Apartment Community Surveillance services, contact us today.
With SentriForce:
There is no equipment to buy, maintain or repair.
Our services are affordable and budget friendly.
Security video surveillance is quickly installed by licensed professionals.
