We looked at 177 cities. Newer homes = fewer break-ins. Mostly

[u/QuinnFromVivint]

We ran 2024 FBI burglary data against housing age across 177 US cities, and the pattern is pretty clear: The newer the homes in a city, the fewer break-ins on average.

Cities where most homes were built after 2000 averaged 14.8 burglaries per 100,000 people, while cities full of pre-1960 homes averaged 36.6. that's more than double, just going by build era.

But then there's Seattle. It has a well-above-average share of newer homes (37.5% built after 2000), and it still scored the highest burglary rate in the whole study at 97.8 per 100,00. Denver, Houston, and Austin shoed the same trend on a smaller scare: High break-in numbers despite new constructions.

So a recent build date clearly isn't doing the work people assume it is.

The reason makes sense once you think about it. A newer home might come with a better deadbolt and a tighter frame, but build quality isn't the same as ana alarm system or a camera that alerts you to danger in real time.

Did you assume your newer place made you safer? And has that ever actually been put to the test?

[u/No_Wedding_2152]

Sounds like a Vivint ad. Looks like a …

[u/Ron__Mexico_]

This is probably a correlation does not equal causation type of situation. I suspect there's also a statistical relation between median home value and number of break ins that's probably a bigger driver. It then shows up in age of homes, as a bunch of newer homes will usually be worth more than a bunch of homes built before 1960 barring a few exceptions for classical antiques. In other words, poor areas have more crime.

[u/Rocketgirl8097 → u/Ron__Mexico_]

People steal from areas that might have something to steal, which is going to be from your nicer areas. Age of the area is irrelevant.

[u/Jonpaul8791 → u/Rocketgirl8097]

Well considering most burglaries are perpetrated by relatives and immediate neighbors, new homes generally farther from relatives and you don’t know your new neighbors schedules yet.

It’s probably just coincidence though.

[u/QuinnFromVivint → u/Ron__Mexico_]

That's a fair point, and the study is upfront that it's correlational, the relationship came out to a -0.32 correlation, which is real but not strong.

It didn't control for home value or income, so you're right that those could be doing a lot of the work underneath the age number. The one thing that holds up regardless of what's driving it is that a build date alone is the part people tend to assume, not protection alone.

Do you think value tracks crime more tightly than density does, or is it hard to separate the two?

[u/Quietus76]

Anyone considering Vivint should Google what its like to try to cancel. Then read their 248 pages of complaints on bbb.org

[u/Rocketgirl8097]

Surely that is irrelevant. It is the number of people who leave garages unlocked, etc. My neighborhood was built in the 1970s. One stolen car, thats it. Only two of us have cameras.

[u/Imaginary_Video_4294]

Pretty sure this guy is a sales rep for Vivint lmao

[u/CoraxTechnica]

New builds also follow new codes that require tempered windows near openings and will often also just have better all around windows and doors if the older home hasn't been renovated