hiding money?

Do you stash cash in your house? Or are you a bank sort of person? At the Personal Finance Advice Blog, the author interviewed a former burglar about the best places to look for money. The former burglar gave many interesting suggestions.

The number place to leave your cash is at the bank! Because no matter how smart you think you are, these burglars are smarter than you would think, this is their professional job, and they have done it a lot. So they have experienced many scenarios.

He said to leave money out and about. Sometimes theives will take money that is left out and leave. So they won't bother tearing your house up. Burglars want to do two things, get money and get out fast. So trying to hide money sometimes is more detrimental than helpful.

The truth is that many burglars know all the typical hiding places for money. So you should strategically place money in these places like dresser drawers, closet, etc. This will prevent the burglar from tearing your house apart as he looks for money. Second he'll leave much quicker if he thinks he's found your stash. Third don't put things in out of place sorts. Like a campbell's soup can in the bedroom. This makes it an obvious place to stash money. Fourth, if you have a safe deposit box make it obvious, label a folder or envelope with that information. That way the burglar knows you have nothing valuable. Also if you have a safe, lock it down. Also if you stash money make sure you tell someone where you put it, in case you die or something. So your family doesn't just throw out the cash with the item.

We keep our money in a fire safe, not much either like $100 I think. We also keep important documents in there mostly. And yes I think maybe we should get a safety deposit box, but I'm not ready for that step yet. However our firesafe is very, very heavy over 50 lbs and I doubt a burglar could just up and carry it easily. He'd be better off stealing our flat screen tv or something. So I'm not worried about it.

One funny thing I thought, is telling your family about the money. Why? Because I guess my grandmother doesn't trust banks or something so she keeps everything in cash. And she squirrels away money everywhere in the house, and it's super easy to forget. She just "misplaces" the money, then has my mom run around the house looking for it. I doubt a burglar would find the money if she can't even remember where it is. So that being said, tell your family where you leave your money. After all what if something happens? I think we'll be tearing my grandmother's house apart for her savings all in cash. Sigh.