In six years, Jette has halved its residential burglaries: 343 incidents in 2019, 172 in 2025, a fall of 49.9%. Few Brussels municipalities show such a clear trend. One question remains that the statistics never ask: what happens to this protection when the house is a building site, the window frames have been removed and three different trades have a key?
One of the most favourable trends in the Region
Incidents recorded by the federal police for Jette: 343 in 2019, 223 in 2020, 214 in 2021, 237 in 2022, 253 in 2023, 188 in 2024, 172 in 2025.
The curve is not a steady decline. After the lockdown low, the municipality rose two years in a row — 237 then 253 — before a clear drop in 2024, confirmed in 2025 by a further fall of 8.5%. It is this confirmation that counts: a single year does not make a trend; two consecutive years do.
The fall is even more impressive if you look further back. Jette reached its peak in 2015, with 477 incidents, and recorded 310 in 2000. The municipality is now well below its level at the start of the century, at an average of 3.3 residential burglaries per week.
One figure deserves a closer look, however, because it sets Jette apart from purely residential Brussels municipalities: of the 278 burglaries in buildings recorded in 2025, homes accounted for only 62%. Nearly four incidents in ten therefore target something else — shops along the main roads, offices, workshops, outbuildings, garages. This is the signature of an outer municipality, where housing is interwoven with business activity and many outbuildings.
Outer-city housing: terraced houses, small gardens, garages and outbuildings
Jette is made up of rows of interwar terraced single-family houses, greener residential areas towards Dieleghem and the Laerbeek, and apartment buildings concentrated along the main roads. Many of these houses have been divided into flats over the decades.
This mix produces a particular geography of risk. The street façade is rarely attacked: it is in view. The real point of entry is at the rear, in a strip of narrow, continuous gardens running behind an entire block. It is reached through a single weak point — a garage door, an alleyway, a low wall, an outbuilding — and from there one moves from garden to garden, out of everyone’s sight.
The outbuildings play a double role: targets (tools, bicycles, garage equipment) and stepping stones. A flat lean-to or conservatory roof puts a first-floor window at head height. Securing a ground floor without looking at what gives access to the upper floor is a classic mistake in this type of housing.
During the work: the period when all protection falls away
A house under renovation combines almost all the factors that make an address attractive, and does so visibly from the street.
It is advertised: skip, scaffolding, vans, a planning notice on the façade. It is open: frames removed, an opening temporarily closed with a board, a side door left unlocked all day. It is disorganised: nobody knows exactly who is on site, or how many keys are circulating between the contractor, the electrician, the tiler and the architect. And it is often unoccupied at night, while containing valuable equipment — professional tools, appliances, materials, copper cables.
A few simple measures change the balance of power, and none of them requires waiting for the work to finish:
- Never leave a temporary access point undetected: a simple magnetic contact on a side door or a temporary closure board costs little and covers the exact period of vulnerability.
- Number the keys handed to contractors, and replace the cylinder on completion of the work — not six months later.
- Monitor the site itself: an outdoor bullet camera pointed at the storage area or the scaffolding documents who comes and goes, provided it frames only your plot.
- Plan an outdoor siren from the building phase: in an empty building, noise is the only mechanism with an immediate effect.
- A wireless system can be deployed, moved and extended as the work progresses, so you do not have to choose between securing and progressing — see the range Ajax X-Observer.
After the work: the window where everything is decided
A renovation opens up an opportunity that will not come round again for twenty years. While the walls are open and the chases accessible, an Ajax Fibra wired installation can be fitted without damage or aesthetic compromise, with a permanent power supply and a link immune to radio interference. Missing this window means settling for wireless by default rather than by choice.
The second decision, often badly made: the new frames. Replacing joinery is the moment to choose burglar-resistant glazing and security hardware, whose extra cost is marginal when ordering and considerable afterwards. This is also the type of expense that municipal grants target where they exist — more on this below.
Third point: after the work, the detection plan must reflect the new floor plan. A rear extension, a conservatory or a kitchen opening onto the garden creates glazed surfaces that did not exist before, and shifts the weak point you had identified. The control panel and detectors are repositioned accordingly; our guide which Ajax alarm to choose in Belgium helps you size the whole system according to the actual number of access points.
Grants and free advice: what to check before pricing
Some Belgian municipalities offer a grant for securing homes against burglary. No reliable information confirms one in Jette: the only serious approach is to ask the municipal administration before setting a renovation budget. Two points apply everywhere. These grants fund mechanical protection — reinforced locks and cylinders, burglar-resistant glazing, doors and frames — and cover neither alarm systems nor cameras. And they generally have to be applied for within a short period after the work is completed, which means keeping detailed, itemised invoices from the start of the project.
Free of charge and with no commercial strings attached, the burglary prevention adviser of the Brussels-West police zone (5340) makes home visits. For a renovation project, the ideal is to have the adviser come before the joinery is ordered, not after: the recommendations concern precisely the choices that can no longer be changed once the frames are fitted. The municipality relays prevention advice on its website.
What Belgian law requires, building site or not
Alarm: declaration within ten days via police-on-web, annual confirmation, outdoor siren limited to three minutes, annual maintenance, mandatory alarm verification before police intervention — Royal Decree of 25 April 2007. An installation fitted during the building phase is subject to the same rules as a permanent one. See our guide on the declaration of an alarm system in Belgium.
Camera: declaration on declarationcamera.be, clearly visible regulatory pictogram, register of processing activities, ban on filming the public highway and other people’s property. On a street of terraced houses in Jette, a site camera pointed at scaffolding easily captures the pavement or the neighbouring garden: adjusting the field of view is not an administrative detail, it is the condition for legality. Our article on the camera law in Belgium sets out the rules.
Frequently asked questions
How many burglaries were there in Jette in 2025?
172 residential burglaries were recorded in Jette in 2025, an average of 3.3 per week. This is 8.5% fewer than in 2024 (188 incidents) and 49.9% fewer than in 2019 (343 incidents).
How do you secure a house under renovation in Jette?
By treating temporary access points as permanent ones: opening detection on side doors and temporary closures, an outdoor siren from the building phase, monitoring of the storage area, and strict tracking of the keys handed to contractors. The cylinder must be replaced on completion of the work, not months later.
Is a wired or wireless alarm better during a renovation?
A renovation with open walls is the only opportunity to fit a wired installation without damage or extra making-good costs, with a permanent power supply and a link immune to radio interference. Outside this window, wireless remains the rational choice, especially during the building work itself, when the system must be movable.
Can a municipal grant fund the alarm installed during my building work?
No. Municipal home-security grants, where they exist, cover only mechanical protection: locks, cylinders, burglar-resistant glazing, doors and frames. Alarm systems and cameras are excluded. Moreover, no grant could be confirmed for Jette: check with the municipality before setting your budget.
Which access points are most exposed in a Jette house?
The rear and its outbuildings. The adjoining small gardens form a continuous strip behind the block, accessible through a single weak point — garage, alleyway or outbuilding — and then crossed out of sight. The flat roofs of lean-tos and conservatories act as stepping stones to the first-floor windows.
Sources: Police crime statistics, Federal Police DGR/DRI/BIPOL, publication 2025_T04 (cut-off date 24/04/2026) — Jette municipal fact sheet. Municipal home-security support schemes change from one budget year to the next: check with your administration before incurring any costs.