7 Gun Safe Tips to Keep Your Family and Friends Safe

If you're a gun owner, storing your guns safely and securely is a big deal. One of the most common ways to do this is with a gun safe. However, not all gun safes are made equal as there are many flimsy ones on the market. Choosing the right gun safe is an important step in keeping your guns secure. Let's look at seven tips to make sure your gun safe does what it's supposed to keep your family safe.

1. Talk About Where You Store Your Guns
Telling your friends and family where you store your guns is intrinsically different from telling random strangers where you store them. There should be a middle ground of having your guns safely stored while also having them accessible if they should be needed. After all, in an emergency, your guns won't help if no one knows where they are or how to access them. Some aspects to where you store your guns depend on your kids as well. If your kids know their way around firearms, your needs will be different from someone whose kids have friends over all the time unsupervised.

2. Assess What You Have
The type of guns you own also plays a part in the decision. The important thing is to consider the ramifications of someone gaining access to your guns who shouldn't have them. This is where you need to think about layers of security. Do you need just a safe? Or do you also need a trigger lock plus a separate ammo lockbox? In most cases, you probably want to store your guns and ammo separately.

3. Consider Your Situation
Why do you own guns? Some people might have a gun or two for personal protection, while others have them to hunt or for their job, i.e. with law enforcement. If you're not an avid shooter or hunter, then your kids may not know anything about guns. If your kids are involved in shooting, then you'll probably want a setup where they have access to some firearms and ammo, but not all. However, if you have unsupervised kids going in and out of your house regularly, you'll want to keep your gun safe in an area of the house they can't access.

4. Shop Around
Don't just run out and buy the first safe you see. A gun safe is an important investment and you need to make sure that it fits what you want. Consider asking your gun-owning friends about their setups to get an idea of what might work. You might see some interesting things like reinforced walls for safe doors or old, heavy-duty safes turned into gun safes.

5. Buy A Safe From A Locksmith
Professional locksmiths can also be a big help when it comes to choosing a safe. Consider searching for a gun safe locksmith near me to find locksmiths that can give you an estimate on installing a safe. They are also experts in all the top brands and types of safe. You can depend on a professional locksmith to deliver and install your safe to make it fully secure against burglars. You're unlikely to get this same level of service from a retail store.

6. Stick To Your Plan
Once you've bought a safe and have a plan on what to keep in it, make sure you stick to it. Don't leave guns outside of it that are supposed to be in it. Don't leave the key laying around, and don't post the code somewhere in plain sight. You should also practice accessing your safe in a hurry. Can you get into it in dim light or without light? Can your spouse also get into it? Your plan should include the gun safe itself, plus plans and rules on who can use it and when.

7. Are Your Measures Working?
You should also monitor how your plan is working. Are your kids still safely unaware of how to get into the safe? If your kids are older, should you talk to them about firearms? It's also important that your spouse knows how to access firearms for defense.

Storing guns safely is of the utmost importance when it comes to keeping your guns away from those who shouldn't have them while also keeping your family safe.