Protect your Rental Property from Kitchen Fires

Rental properties can be terrific investments for many people. However irresponsible tenants can turn what were supposed to be income properties into large financial losses. One of the most common insurance claims in North America whether it is rental properties or otherwise are insurance claims against kitchen fires.

Most kitchen fires are caused by what is termed “unattended cooking”, essentially leaving the kitchen while the oven is still on and a meal is being cooked.
An unfortunate truth with holiday renters is that they are often distracted during their stay (after all, they are on vacation!) and more likely to slip up when it comes to basic home or property safety than they would be at home. With this unattended cooking fires are all to frequent at vacation properties. One quick and easy investment in your vacation property which can help to instantly limit, or even completely eliminate these sorts of expensive mistakes is by purchasing and install an automatic stove shut off device such as our StoveGuard.

The StoveGuard is a simple idea with terrific results! There are two components to the system, a motion sensor with built in countdown timer and a shutoff switch, either an electrical switch or a gas shut off valve. The time is adjustable by the end user, so the property owner or manager can set the time to whatever time frame they feel is reasonable, every time the motion sensor detects motion it restarts the timer. So for example if the timer is set for 20 minutes and the kitchen remains empty for 20 consecutive minutes while the stove is on than the StoveGuard will automatically shutoff power to the stove or close the gas line depending of course on the type of stove it is monitoring.

For rental property owners this can be an inexpensive and very effective method of protecting their properties from unexpected losses due to kitchen fires.