The holiday season arrives with a certain electricity – lights, gatherings, deliveries stacking up on porches. Most of us are focused on the giving part. Thieves, unfortunately, are focused on something else entirely. December has recorded the highest property crime numbers of any month for three consecutive years, with FBI data showing a nearly eleven percent jump in offenses from November to December 2024. That’s not a minor uptick. It’s a pattern.
One in four Americans has had a package stolen at some point, and package thieves stole over eight billion dollars worth of online orders over the past year, with each stolen package worth about two hundred and twenty-two dollars on average. Knowing where to store your gifts and valuables – and ranking those options honestly – can make a meaningful difference this season.
1. A Bank Safe Deposit Box
A safe deposit box is a secure, locked container typically located in a bank’s vault, providing a highly secure place to store important documents, valuables, and other items that you want to keep safe from theft, fire, or natural disasters. For irreplaceable jewelry, family heirlooms, or collectibles you won’t need to access daily, nothing at home comes close to this level of protection.
Boxes are generally viewed as more secure options than home safes for storing valuables such as jewelry, coins, and collectibles, with deposit box renters storing items in a secured room with a heavy vault door, closed-circuit surveillance, and sophisticated alarm systems. One practical caveat worth noting: safe deposit boxes are not insured by the FDIC, so be mindful of what you decide to store, or consider additional insurance coverage.
2. A Floor-Anchored or Wall-Bolted Home Safe
A safe is a secure space to store money, records, valuables, and confidential documents, but if it’s not attached to the floor or a wall and is portable, it’s easy for a burglar to walk off with the entire unit – and if something is locked, it signals to a thief that there are valuable items inside, making it more tempting. The bolting step is non-negotiable.
Bolting your safe to the floor prevents it from being tipped over, which gives thieves leverage to pry the door open, and also stops them from removing the entire safe to be opened elsewhere – most burglary attempts involve attacking the safe in this manner, making proper anchoring a critical security measure. If you use an in-home safe, make sure it has a tool and torch resistant rating of at least thirty minutes, is too heavy for a burglar to carry, or is bolted to the floor or home structure.
3. A Secure Package Locker or Carrier Pickup Location
Package thefts increase when people turn to the internet to buy gifts at the end of the year, and nearly seventy percent of 2025 holiday shopping happened online, with each adult expecting roughly twenty-five packages between October and December – twice as many as in an average three-month period. With that kind of volume, leaving every delivery on a doorstep is simply risky.
Secure pickup locations such as Amazon Lockers and carrier facilities provide a ninety-five to ninety-eight percent theft reduction, while package lockboxes offer about ninety-four percent reduction. These numbers are hard to argue with. Routing high-value deliveries to a locker instead of an unattended porch is one of the most effective single actions you can take during the holiday rush.
4. An In-Home Safe Hidden Inside a Closet
While some might think a safe needs a dedicated room, two of the most practical and strategic locations are often overlooked: the closet and the garage, which offer unique advantages for security, discretion, and accessibility, and a well-planned installation integrates flawlessly into your home’s layout. Concealment adds a meaningful second layer on top of the safe’s physical security.
A closet can enhance security through concealment – since most burglars want to be in and out quickly, a hidden safe is one they might not find, and as long as the safe is properly bolted to the floor or wall studs, its structural security remains just as formidable as a safe placed in the open. The combination of a locked, bolted safe tucked inside a cluttered closet is genuinely difficult for a thief working quickly under pressure.
5. A Child’s Room (Used Strategically)
Burglars who make their way into your house search for prized possessions to sell, and it makes sense that they won’t think to ransack a kids’ bedroom, especially ones filled with toys and clutter – you can hide a valuable item there, but make sure to keep it high up on a shelf where a child won’t be able to reach it either. This isn’t exactly a high-tech solution, but it works precisely because thieves follow predictable patterns.
Children typically possess few costly possessions, and most thieves will skip over their rooms, making a child’s room an unexpected place for storing valuables. Wrap a gift or small valuable inside a sealed, unmarked box and tuck it behind a pile of board games or stuffed animals. It’s about breaking the routine path a burglar would follow through your home.
6. The Garage, Labeled as Ordinary Clutter
When looking for valuables, thieves are less likely to ransack a garage than an office or family room, where they’re more likely to find electronics, documents, cash, and heirlooms – making the garage an ideal place to keep things hidden by tucking valuables inside boxes and marking them with unassuming labels like “holiday decorations” or “camping gear.” The psychology here is simple: boring containers get ignored.
Keeping valuables in storage bins or boxes mixed with and labeled as other seemingly dull or worthless items, such as “Holiday Décor,” “Summer Clothes,” or “School Projects,” can be a deterrent for burglars. The garage is also a practical location for a bolted safe, since it offers ample space and a solid concrete foundation, making it an ideal location for larger, heavier safes.
7. Behind Wall Art or Inside a Deep Picture Frame
Picture frames, paintings, mirrors, and other wall decor throughout the house offer an opportunity to hide valuables – with a bit of tape and an envelope, any wall hanging can discreetly store important items, and a deep wooden frame offers greater potential, as you can neatly cut the paper backing and slide cash or prized possessions into the narrow gap between the artwork and the frame backing.
Very thin items may even fit between a picture and the backing, and to find the stashed valuables, would-be thieves would have to choose the right piece of artwork and remove the dust cover on the back of the frame – not easy to do quickly. This works especially well for flat items like gift cards, folded cash, or thin jewelry. Spread across multiple frames in different rooms, it’s a genuinely low-visibility strategy.
8. The Freezer, Wrapped and Camouflaged
If you have a large storage freezer, you might consider using it to store more than just food – wrap valuables in aluminum foil and put them in the freezer with other frozen foods, since burglars probably won’t go through all the items in a freezer. It’s one of those ideas that sounds strange until you think about it from a thief’s perspective, which is exactly the point.
The freezer is a genius place to hide things because most thieves won’t ever think to look there. Keep in mind that this option works only for items that won’t be damaged by cold temperatures, and anything electronic or moisture-sensitive should be sealed carefully in a waterproof bag first. Treat it as a secondary layer alongside stronger primary options, not as a standalone solution for your most valuable possessions.
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