Entry point
The Front Door
Anybody who owns the door they walk through every day and has never taken a screw out of the strike plate. It assumes a conventional timber or composite door in a timber frame, hung inward, with a handle and probably a deadbolt. If you rent, the rented apartment door page covers the same ground with the alterations removed.
What constrains the work
- Anything drilled into a fire-rated door or frame can void the rating it was certified with, and entrance doors in shared buildings often are rated.
- A front door is a way out as well as a way in, and interior restraints stop it working as an exit for everybody, including emergency crews.
- Cameras at the front cover a public approach, which raises audio and privacy questions that depend on where you live.
Start with what costs nothing
These come before any purchase on this page, and on most doors they do more.
- Take the key out from under the mat, the pot and the fake rock.
- Leave the porch light on after dark.
- Cut the shrub that hides the door from the street back below waist height.
- Replace the strike and hinge screws with longer ones — the only item here that costs anything, and it is the price of a coffee.
Deter
Change what the place looks like to somebody deciding whether to bother.
Everything a stranger can assess from the sidewalk in four seconds: whether the approach is lit, whether the door is visible from anywhere, and whether the place looks attended. None of it stops anybody determined, and all of it moves a house down a list of easy options.
Do first
- Turn on the light over the door after dark and leave it on. It costs pennies and it removes the shadow the door sits in.
- Cut back anything that screens the door from the street. A hedge that hides the door from neighbors hides it from everybody.
- Stop leaving a key anywhere outside the house. Under the mat, in the pot, on the ledge, in the fake rock: all of these are checked.
- Clear the porch of anything that shows the house is empty, starting with an accumulating pile of mail.
Jobs that add this layer
- Place an Outdoor Camera — Drilling required, 1 to 2 hours per camera
Detect
Know that something is happening while it is still happening.
Knowing somebody is at the door while they are still at the door. In practice this is the layer households use every day and think about least, because most of its value is the ordinary question of who is knocking, answered without opening.
Do first
- Check whether the existing peephole is clear and at a height everybody in the house can use.
- Agree a household rule about not opening the door to unexpected callers, and tell children what it is.
- If a doorbell camera is already fitted, trim its motion zone to your own approach so its alerts still mean something.
Jobs that add this layer
- Place a Doorbell Camera — Drilling required, 1 hour, longer if wiring is involved
Where hardware is genuinely needed
- Video Doorbells — seeing the doorstep before opening it
Delay
Make the opening take longer and louder to get through than it looks.
How long the door takes to get through, and how much noise that takes. This is the only layer that changes the outcome rather than the record of it, and almost all of it lives in the frame: what the strike plate is anchored to, whether the bolt fully engages, and whether the hinges are screwed into framing or into trim.
Do first
- Take one screw out of the strike plate and look at how long it is. This tells you most of what you need to know about the door.
- Close the door and throw the deadbolt. If it needs the door lifted or shoved, it is not fully engaging and the lock is decorative.
- Check the hinge screws on the inside. They are usually the same short screws as the strike and get replaced in the same fifteen minutes.
Jobs that add this layer
- Measure Your Door First — Basic tools, 10 minutes per door, renter safe
- Reinforce the Strike Plate — Basic tools, 15 minutes, renter safe
- Fit a Deadbolt Properly — Drilling required, 1 hour for a straight swap, longer for a new bore
- Add a Door Reinforcement Lock — Drilling required, 45 minutes, plus the time to check whether you are allowed to fit one
Where hardware is genuinely needed
- Deadbolts & Keypad Locks — controlling who has a key, and what happens when the battery dies
- Door Reinforcement Locks & Bars — buying time at the door, without blocking the way out
Document
Keep a record that still exists when somebody asks for it.
What still exists a week later. A doorbell camera produces the record of the doorstep, and the question that decides whether it is worth anything is where that record is kept and for how long.
Do first
- Write down which camera covers the door and where its footage goes. Most people cannot answer this about their own house.
- Set a retention period deliberately rather than accumulating footage forever by default.
- Put a unique password and a second factor on whatever account holds the footage.
Jobs that add this layer
- Choose Local or Cloud Storage — No tools, 30 minutes of thinking, before you buy anything, renter safe
Where hardware is genuinely needed
- Security Cameras — seeing what happened, and knowing where the footage lives
- Video Doorbells — seeing the doorstep before opening it