Who has been hanging around your house? Seems like a simple question, but when you stop to think about all the people who cross your threshold in the course of a year, then you really don’t know, do you?
Chances are you feel protected from intrusion. If you own a house you may have an electronic security system. Probably there is a Neighborhood Watch in your area. The police are just a phone call away and everyone in your building or on your street always seem so nice.
If you are a single parent, chances are you have housekeepers and nannies looking out for your children. If you are a homeowner, then chances are you have contractors and their workman coming and going. Sure the contractor may be thoroughly licensed. But what about the people they hire? Who looks into their backgrounds to see if they are who they really say they are and what they are all about?
If you are dating, then chances are new romantic prospects are coming by your place to pick you up. They may be interesting in only you. They may be even more interested in your children? How can you really tell?
It may sound distracting and even annoying to bother looking into the people other than your family who populate your home. Let’s face, it is tough to take time from our modern busy schedules to bother verifying people and their histories. We have to make a serious effort, and then we have to confront the results of our research. Certain people may turn out to be other than who we supposed they are. Then what?
That seemingly gifted plumber who will even make night calls may be used to working nights, since his last profession was burglary. It may matter; and then it may not. How about the new guy working for the contractor who is redoing your kitchen, the one adjacent to the master bedroom? Where you keep your jewelry and natural possessions. Yeah, what about him?
This article is not designed to make you paranoid or render you so full of fear you forbid anyone access to your house. What is designed to do is to point out the different places in your daily life where you are vulnerable to theft and possible bodily harm. Sure, we all know about street crime, burglars, scam artists and having the misfortune of encountering someone of a violent nature. The thing is, most of us never take the necessary precautions, the available precautions on the people who can con us, harm us and steal from us.
If you have a contractor working on your house, then research his business references and, above all, make sure he is licensed and bonded to perform the services for which he was hired. You should do the same for nannies and housekeepers. Avoid tragedies by running criminal checks, credit checks, and check out their license, if necessary. Doing so will help you avoid costly and often tragic mistakes. The last thing you need is to be telling sad stories on the six o’clock news.
I could go on all day about how many women who use online dating services are snookers by the scam artists who design everything to appeal only to you….and maybe the next dozen or so women they encounter. Reveal the wrong information, invite them over to your place, and you may discover months in the future that you are now a victim of identity theft. If you have children then the last thing you need is to be allowing pedophiles the chance to get near your kids. Check out your state’s sexual offenders registry. It’s free. And for a nominal charge you can run the search in the sexual offender’s registry in all fifty states. Many have, and many are grateful that they have done so.
Your home is supposed to be your one secure spot in a messed up world. You are supposed to be able to relax, attend to your hobbies, have love affairs, and be with your children in peace and safety. You are not supposed to be concerned about interlopers, molesters and thieves posing as workmen or nannies. We may have forgotten that there are, after all, certain rights to which we are entitled. Only today, to protect those rights, there is a price. Often the ounce of prevention is gotten for a nominal fee. The cure can be very costly.
So do yourself a favor and do the homework on the people you have working for you and maybe even the person whom you are dating. There are all kinds of research tools available, and there are many respectable background checking services. There may be an effort in protecting self and family, but then what did you expect in this life? The cost is nominal. And the peace of mine, to quote a credit card commercial, is priceless.
About the Author:
Gordon Basichis is the author of the best selling Beautiful Bad Girl, the Vicki Morgan Story, a non-fiction novel that helped define exotic sexuality in the late twentieth century. He is also the author of The Constant Travellers, a new age, fantasy Western. He recently finished a new book Chinese Takeout, a Roman A'Clef detailing Chinese Espionage in the United States. A professional marketing executive, Basichis is also co-founder of the Corra Group www.corragroup.com specializing in pre-employment and online dating background checks, as well as corporate research and investigation.
What Lurks Outside Your House is Sometimes Not as Bad as What is Already Inside It
