Parcel boxes replace newspapers as top vacancy signal for solo households on vacation

The rapid growth of single-person households and the normalization of online shopping are reshaping how South Koreans think about home security during the summer vacation season, a new survey shows.

Where stacked newspapers or uncollected milk bottles once signaled an empty home, parcels piling up at the front door — along with the personal information printed on their labels — have emerged as the new markers of vacancy and the new targets of crime.

S-One, a comprehensive security solutions company, released the findings Saturday from a survey on housing safety awareness during the vacation season, conducted from July 7 to 10 among 7,556 of its security service customers.

According to the survey, 60.3 percent of respondents said they plan to leave their homes empty this summer for a vacation or extended outing. More than half — 55.3 percent — said they would be away for three days or more at a stretch, underscoring growing concern about security during prolonged absences.

The survey found a clear divergence in what worries different types of households. Among single-person households, the top concern when leaving home for vacation was parcel theft at the front door, cited by 59.1 percent of respondents, followed by break-ins targeting empty homes at 46.2 percent. The results suggest that everyday crimes such as delivery theft now weigh more heavily on solo residents than the traditionally dominant fear of intruders.

The gap was particularly stark among women living alone: 51.4 percent said they worried that deliveries could expose the fact that they live by themselves, compared with just 4.2 percent of men. The finding reflects a growing awareness that shipping labels bearing a resident's name and address can reveal their living situation, turning the front doorstep into a potential gateway for privacy violations.

Behind these shifts lie two structural trends: a surge in single-person households and the explosive growth of online shopping. According to Statistics Korea, single-person households numbered about 8.045 million last year, accounting for 36.1 percent of all households — an increase of more than 2.8 million over the past decade. With more homes lacking a co-resident to manage deliveries during absences, annual domestic parcel volume has also surpassed 6 billion for the first time in history, increasing exposure to doorstep crime, the survey analysis noted.

Among single-person households that own pets, concern about animals left at home topped the list by a wide margin, cited by 72.5 percent of respondents. Their primary worries were health emergencies affecting the animal during their absence, at 64.3 percent, and sudden accidents such as fires, at 45.6 percent — anxieties that arise both during weekday commutes and vacation periods.

Multi-person households, by contrast, still focused primarily on physical security at entry points. Their top concerns were unfamiliar people approaching the home, at 55.0 percent; break-ins targeting empty houses, at 43.7 percent; and the frustration of being unable to check on the home from outside, at 43.1 percent — reflecting continued vigilance against traditional burglary. In addition, 35.8 percent of households living with elderly parents said their biggest worry was not property damage but emergency situations such as a fall by an elderly family member left at home, or safety when strangers come to the door.

Across all household types, one trend stood out: respondents overwhelmingly want to monitor and control their homes in real time while away. When asked whether they had ever wanted to check on the inside of their home or their front door in real time while on vacation, 83.8 percent of single-person household respondents and 87.0 percent of multi-person household respondents said yes. More than half of both groups said they would consider using a home security system capable of remote monitoring, anomaly detection and emergency dispatch. Awareness of social media exposure was also high — 88.2 percent of respondents said they knew that posts could reveal their absence, and 23.7 percent said they had deliberately delayed uploading vacation photos for that reason.

A significant share of respondents had also experienced actual security threats while away. Some 53.3 percent said they had encountered such a threat after leaving their home empty. By type, the most common incidents were unfamiliar traces left at the front door, at 36.5 percent; missing parcels, at 16.2 percent; and an unknown person captured on CCTV footage, at 10.2 percent.

"The paradigm of empty-home anxiety has diversified — from burglary prevention in the past to parcel theft at the front door and care for pets and family members left behind," an S-One official said. "In line with this trend, sales of our S-One AI door camera surged 318 percent in June compared with the monthly average, reflecting rapidly growing demand for smart home security."