Saturday, July 11, 2009

Control your chances of being a crime victim

Avoiding crime in Mexico - from Chapala message board

You can control your chances of being a victim of crime. Some ideas:

1) Scout out areas and live in a lower crime area (sometimes the lower crime areas might not be close to where you want to live)

2) Trust nobody, give your keys to nobody and don't brag about what you have or when you won't be home

3) Make sure if you have a car that you lock it all the time, park it in secured parking and never leave anything intriguing or valuable looking in plain sight.

4) Smile and know your neighbours

5) Don't bring valuable junk like gaudy jewellery and riches as you are in Mexico, having more than a poor Mexican means little and if you were rich you'd have a million dollar home on the beach, not be living in the Chapala area flaunting your riches.

6) Don't just hire anybody to work at your home. Some gringos are very naive and will hire a worker on the recommendation of another gringo without first ascertaining how long they worked for that person and if they have a good reputation in the community. You don't need workers but it is a nice bonus to pay relatively little and not have to sweep, mop and scrub toilets all the time.

7) Make sure you have adequate lighting around your home and look for ways to discourage burglars. Some homes have adjoining walls and connect to roofs of other homes, this is a recipe for disaster, especially in areas with a higher crime rate.

8) Don't mess with drugs or walk around in the wee hours of the night or drunk where you are not in control.

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The construction of the house finished in April 2011 and I'm pretty much settled in. As of March 2014 I'm in preparation for rain mode for this coming summer. That includes sealing and painting things and dealing with drainage issues from last year.

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