Locking doors at night

They don’t need to be right next to the door, just somewhere easily accessible. And it’s only a door with a letterbox or by an open window someone nefarious is going to grab your keys. It really isn’t stupid to leave a key near a door provided it can’t be reached from outside.

My rule is lock the door behind you.
We have six external doors plus the garage (which we go in and out of to leave and enter the house)
I categorically don't have time to check all doors when leaving the house so can only work on the assumption they are all locked and therefore same goes for night time ...

It's just plain stupid. Don't do it.

I easily got back into my own house by hooking the keys off the bench in the hall where I'd put them to put my coat on before absentmindedly leaving without them.

"don't do this stupid thing, do this other stupid thing instead" is never good advice.

I don’t have anyone to argue with about it, but it would be last person to bed who checks - makes sense to me. But I very rarely lock my back door, it’s nearly always unlocked, unless I’m going away. If my daughter is staying over she always locks it, then in the morning I’m always surprised when I go to open it to let the cat out.

There is access through my back gate, but you wouldn’t know that unless you live in one of the other houses that share the hidden alleyway, so I’ve never even considered that anyone would try and get in. And anyway it’s so overlooked by nosy neighbours that anyone looking out of place is immediately filmed and posted on the local Facebook group - this also applies to suspicious looking cats, dogs and pigeons 😁

My front door has a Yale lock so it locks itself, I would make sure that was locked otherwise though, but mostly so my friend who lives round the corner can’t just walk in unannounced!

Hopefully nobody on MN knows where I live 😁 but I can’t remember the last time we had any crime here, maybe because it’s neither a naice area or a rough one 🤷🏻

It’s far better than leaving it completely unlocked! Lesser of two evils.

Do not leave your keys on a hook by the door!

EVERYONE should be locking the door behind them so it becomes habit and the last person to bed should be checking as well.

To those not locking doors when inside, remember it invalidates your home insurance should you be burgled. You’d be far better leaving keys in the door or on a Command hook near the door if you’re worried about fire.

I'm just amazed people don't have their front doors locked all the time . The UK must be a sneak thief paradise in the summer .

You co-sleep with a four year old? You go to bed at 7.30pm? There are much worse things going on in this marriage than who locks the doors at night.

Even the back door?

This wouldn't work in our house. People are coming in and out without keys all the time and we have pets which come in and out all day. I'd be up and down like a blue arsed fly!

Most peoples idea of security is pretty woeful. They neglect the obvious and lack the ability to think like thieves.

A lot of people also believe that if people want to break in they will and there is nothing they can do about it. This is true. If someone wants to get into your house they will no matter how hard you try to secure it.

OTOH most thieves want to be able to get in quickly and make off quickly with small items which are valuable stuff (hint keeping all your jewellery in the jewellery box on the bedside table is a really bad idea). The last thing they want to do is encounter people, because the penalty vs. the gain simply doesn't stack up.

Thieves go for easy targets and if your house looks secure then they will pass it up in favour of one that looks easier. In short, you make yourself a victim. Thieves are far more likely to rob houses with poor security. And that is great news for anyone who makes the effort to make their house reasonably secure.

But he neither locks it after him or checks if he's last to bed - so his argument is pointless!

We go with last to bed locks up. It's the only way to be sure everything is locked.

Surely that would be a job for security?

I put YABU because unless you have a concrete system you should both be checking them. Having said this, I personally assume doors get locked behind you and forget my husband neither does this nor checks them when he comes up to bed as the last one up 🙄

Our front door is locked all the time, as soon as we come in it gets locked. But as I'm the last one to bed, I check it on the way past to make sure. I have the back door wedged open all day, so I'm the one who closes and locks that, although on a couple of occasions, I've found it unlocked on a morning when I've got up, if my husband has been out the back. Thankfully nobody can access the back of our house easily.
So I'd say last one around at night should lock up!

If you know he won’t check them, just lock up before you go to bed? He sounds like an idiot trying to make an excuse for forgetting to lock up, but for the sake of safety and peace of mind it’s not worth the battle is it?

We always lock the doors after we've used it. However I check them before I head to bed, because my husband's of the mentality as yours. Once we had an unlocked door overnight, now I can't sleep unless I check them.

It’s the man’s fault.

Last (adult) to bed does shutdown. As a single parent, that's obviously me, I do the little walk around the house, checking the patio doors if anyone's used them, the back door, the front door, turning out any lights left as I go.

This is normal.

Your rule is better once your 4 year old can open the backdoor. We had a rule of keeping everything locked up but now the kids open the backdoor all the time and leave it unlocked we have to check every night.

Your husband needs to give up smoking, then there’ll be no need to open the door again - problem solved! Plus there’ll be an extra few thousand in the family purse every year, and you could probably replace the door handles that are stiff.

We have exactly the same argument, this plus turning the heating down before coming to bed! So infuriating!

Last to bed. 100%.
it’s too easy to nip pout to grab the laundry or put out rubbish, feed the cat etc to rely on the last one in rule. There was a case a couple of years ago when some horror of a man entered houses through unlocked doors at night to assault kids in their beds. I used to have family members who smoked and would forever be leaving the back door open. No way would I rely on last one in

He needs to grow up. If he’s last to bed, he checks the doors, end of.

Does he not want to protect his family?

3 doors really doesn’t take much time. Whoever goes to bed last always checks our windows and doors are locked, it’s what normal adults do without needing a medal each time.

Maybe start a star chart for this little man.