Backdrop: First part of April (2019) we had a county sewer line in our subdivision back up – on a saturday no less. Result was a basement (built out living room / den) that was flooded in raw sewage. It was backing up through a drain in our basement used by the air conditioner and water heater overflow. Imagine a water fountain of raw sewage bubbling up out of your basement floor!!

The county watershed management officials (and a county commissioner) finally came out and they brought in the heavy equipment to clear the entire sewer line. The flooding finally stopped – but not before everything that came into contact with the slurry became a total loss – including my safe. The county water/sewer department and our commissioner agreed – they owned it. In addition to the safe, we lost book cases, file cabinets, an office desk, anything that was sitting on the carpet and was made of wood was a write-off.

The deconstruction and cleaning of my basement den began with a county contracted servpro outfit. Word of advice from experience: NEVER use ServPro, even to clean your driveway!! Meanwhile, I had to decide on a replacement safe. I had bought my original American Security safe in 1992, so finding a dollar-for-dollar, apples-to-apples matchup was impossible, not to mention sticker shock.

An ‘oogle’ search brought up Atlanta Safe House in Acworth. Given their vast inventory, a visit to eyeball everything was a must. Jeff Stallcup was awesome. He brought me up from 1992 to 2019 in terms of how safe technology and materials had advanced in 27 years. The sheer number of choices was rather overwhelming; it was worse than buying a car. Jeff was absolutely ZERO pressure. He was very thorough with comparisons between brands, and models within each brand. By now I was better enlightened, but still totally confused.

With product brochures in hand, and while my basement den was still in mid deconstruction stage, and being made safe to be in again, I narrowed down my choice – so I thought.

I paid Jeff another visit intending to buy a certain Browning safe that was on special only to find a Liberty Fat Boy Extreme Jr for two Franklins more – last year’s model (big wooo!) and for a whole lot less than this year’s model of essentially the same thing. It had everything I needed, and was configured for my needs. I paid for the safe and arranged for delivery at a later date when all the deconstruction would be finished.

Finally time to remove the old and bring in the new. Jeff and his assistant made the akward trek around my yard with this half-ton behemoth, and into the basement entrance. He unbolted the old safe and removed it. The floor was scrubbed clean and prepped for the new Liberty. It was put into place, holes in the foundation were drilled, and the safe secured.

Overall experience of the sewage flood: miserable. Overall experience dealing with Atlanta Safe House: outstanding !! For anyone who needs a gun safe or any kind of safe for that matter, if THE SAFE HOUSE isn’t your first stop, it will be your last stop!

I don’t always shop for safes . . . but when I do, I shop THE SAFE HOUSE.