Aalst recorded 120 residential burglaries in 2025, compared with 217 in 2019: a fall of 44.7% in six years, and the lowest point in the entire available series. The figure is good. However, it says nothing about the door through which burglars actually get into a house in Aalst — and it is precisely this question that determines how effective an installation will be.
Seven years of figures for Aalst
| Year | Residential burglaries |
|---|---|
| 2019 | 217 |
| 2020 | 185 |
| 2021 | 146 |
| 2022 | 242 |
| 2023 | 166 |
| 2024 | 149 |
| 2025 | 120 |
The series is not a steady slope, and that is what makes it interesting. After two low years — 185 in 2020, 146 in 2021, when homes were occupied far more often than usual — 2022 rebounded sharply to 242, even above the 2019 level: once houses were empty again during working hours, the incidents followed. The real decline only set in afterwards: 166, then 149, then 120, three consecutive falls and 19.5% fewer over the last year.
Compared with the 2016 peak (366 incidents), Aalst has divided its volume by three in less than ten years, and is now below its 2000 level (228 incidents). The current rate: 2.3 residential burglaries per week.
One detail in the fact sheet is worth highlighting: of the 176 burglaries in buildings recorded in 2025, only 68% targeted a home. Nearly a third of break-ins in Aalst therefore involve other types of buildings. In a city with a commercial centre and a fabric of workshops and outbuildings, homes are the main target, not the only one.
Housing in Aalst: a dense centre, a suburban ring
Aalst combines two building patterns that could not be more different from a burglary point of view.
The centre is made up of terraced townhouses, built on the street line with no front setback, each with a courtyard or narrow garden enclosed by a wall. The façade is in full view of everyone, which protects it; the rear is accessible via the neighbouring plot or an alleyway, and is visible to no one.
The outer ring, on the other hand, is suburban: semi-detached houses, small gardens, attached garages, garden sheds, sometimes a conservatory added later. Hedges are higher there and there are far fewer overlooking neighbours.
Both share one decisive feature: the risk lies at the rear and in the outbuildings, not at the front door. An installation that protects the front façade protects the part of the building that is not being attacked.
The garage, the outbuilding and the conservatory: the three blind spots
Three access points account for most of the problem in this type of housing, and all three are regularly overlooked.
The attached garage first. Its up-and-over or sectional door rarely matches the security level of a front door, and once inside, the intruder works out of sight on the connecting door to the house — very often a lightweight interior door with a simple latch. The garage turns a visible break-in into a comfortable one.
The garden shed next. It is not just tools that get stolen there: it is where the tools are found. Pliers or a ladder left in an unlocked shed equip the intruder for the house itself.
The conservatory or the rear patio window, finally. Large glazed areas, frames often made of thin aluminium, few locking points, no overlooking neighbours. It is the quickest access point to force, and the quietest if the intruder uses a lever rather than breaking the glass.
The practical consequence is simple: detection must be placed where intruders get in, not where they move around afterwards. A magnetic contact on the garage door, the connecting door and the rear patio window signals the opening the moment it happens. Outdoor detectors aimed at the courtyard or small garden are triggered before the glass even gives way, something no indoor detector can do. And photo-verification detectors at passage points provide the image that tells you, remotely, whether the alert is real.
A bullet camera covering the rear completes the set-up when the plot is deep or the garage is detached. For a first installation, an alarm kit is a base to build on; our guide on which Ajax alarm to choose in Belgium helps you size the system according to the number of access points, and our comparison alarm or camera helps you decide the order of spending.
The Aalst grant: prior advice compulsory, alarms excluded
The City of Aalst awards a burglary security grant (premie inbraakbeveiliging) for private homes within its territory. Two conditions structure it, and one exclusion limits its scope.
First condition: the funded measures must be based on prior theft prevention advice. This is not a formality that can be sorted out afterwards: the advice comes before the works. Second condition: one grant per dwelling per year. The amount is not published in the available documents, and we will not invent it — it must be requested from the city.
The exclusion, for its part, is the same as in most Belgian municipal regulations: the grant funds mechanical security — security cylinders and locks, additional locking points, burglar-resistant glazing, reinforcement of doors, frames and secondary access points — and covers neither alarm systems nor CCTV cameras. Do not count on it to lighten the budget for a detection system; do count on it, however, to reinforce the garage door and the rear patio window, in other words exactly the weak points of Aalst housing. The regulations can be consulted on the City of Aalst’s page on the grant.
Free advice from the Aalst police zone
The advice required for the grant is issued by the diefstalpreventieadviseur (theft prevention adviser) of the Lokale Politie Aalst (5440). The visit is free of charge, with no commercial interest whatsoever, and it can be requested directly online via the zone’s advice request page.
The rational order is therefore as follows: request the advice, have the rear access points and the garage mechanically reinforced with the help of the grant, then install detection at your own expense. This is not an administrative constraint, it is the logic of burglary: time lost on an access point is the main reason for giving up, and the alarm converts that time into an alert.
What Belgian law requires once installed
These rules are federal. For an alarm: registration within ten days via police-on-web, annual confirmation, outdoor siren limited to three minutes, annual maintenance, mandatory verification before police intervention — see our guide to registering an alarm system in Belgium. For a camera: registration on declarationcamera.be, pictogram, register of processing activities, and a ban on filming the public road or the neighbour’s property — a serious constraint in the centre of Aalst, where adjoining gardens touch. See our article on Belgian CCTV camera law.
Frequently asked questions
How many burglaries took place in Aalst in 2025?
120 residential burglaries were recorded in Aalst in 2025, according to the federal police statistics. That is 19.5% fewer than in 2024 (149 incidents) and 44.7% fewer than in 2019 (217 incidents), or 2.3 incidents per week.
Does the Aalst grant cover an alarm system?
No. The Aalst security grant funds mechanical protection: security locks and cylinders, locking points, burglar-resistant glazing, reinforcement of doors and frames. Alarm systems and CCTV cameras are excluded. It also requires prior theft prevention advice and is limited to one grant per dwelling per year.
Where do burglars most often get into a house in Aalst?
Through the rear and the outbuildings, not through the front door. In the city centre, the enclosed courtyard or garden gives access to a rear façade that cannot be seen from the street; on the outskirts, the attached garage, the garden shed and the conservatory are the three recurring weak points, and the connecting door between garage and house is often just an ordinary interior door.
How do I request theft prevention advice in Aalst?
From the diefstalpreventieadviseur (theft prevention adviser) of the Lokale Politie Aalst (5440), via the zone’s request form. The visit is free of charge and has no commercial purpose, and the advice is required to submit a grant application.
Do I need to register an alarm installed in Aalst?
Yes, as everywhere in Belgium. Registration is done via police-on-web within ten days of installation and must be confirmed every year. It derives from the Royal Decree of 25 April 2007 and depends neither on the city nor on the region.
Sources: Police crime statistics, Federal Police DGR/DRI/BIPOL, publication 2025_T04 (cut-off date 24/04/2026) — Aalst municipal fact sheet. Grant regulations: City of Aalst (see the regulations link above). Amounts and conditions change from one financial year to the next: check before incurring any costs.