trevor ...
I don\'t have a safe in my house. I live in a secure gated community and we don\'t have house robberies here.
However, when I was single and coming to the Philippines for vacations, I of course would stay in hotels. Back then I would always select a hotel that had either a room safe or at least a safe at the front desk I could put my money and passport in. Your pretty safe doing it this way.
I used to hear of guys that would get money stolen from there hotel rooms, but in many cases, it was found out that it was not the hotel staff stealing money, but the girl the guy picked up in a bar and had in his room for the night ... In other words ... in \"inside job\".
Maids are also known to steal money you have laying around in your house, so that is something to consider when living here ... My wife says we don\'t need a maid, so I don\'t have to worry about that. I can\'t give you any advice on how to hire an honest maid (I have no idea).
I guess that if my house was not as secure as I would like, I would get a small safe for the house ... but the safe also needs to be secure so they don\'t take the whole thing with them.
Good luck,
Ron