How many burglaries does Dallas have?

The Dallas Police Department reported 6,184 burglaries in 2024 and 5,633 in 2025 through the FBI's Crime Data Explorer, against 6,196 in 2023. The department's own incident file gives 5,968 and 5,563 for the same two years, within about 4 percent. Total property crime fell from 52,637 in 2023 to 40,936 in 2025. The 2025 figures are provisional and subject to revision.

Do I need an alarm permit in Dallas?

Yes, if your security alarm is audible and/or monitored to provide police response. The city publishes an annual permit fee of $50 for a residence and $100 for a business, administered through the Dallas Police Department's Alarm Permit Compliance Unit.

What does a false alarm cost in Dallas?

A permitted alarm site gets three free false burglar alarms in a twelve month period. The 4th, 5th, and 6th are $50 each, the 7th and 8th are $75 each, and the 9th and beyond are $100 each. All panic or holdup false alarms at a residence are $100 each with no free allowance.

Is a self-monitored alarm exempt from the Dallas permit?

Not on the city's published wording. Dallas states a permit is required if you have a security alarm that is audible and/or monitored to provide police response, so an audible siren with no monitoring company still falls inside the requirement. Cameras alone are a different question and worth confirming with the city.

Home Security in Dallas: Burglary Numbers, Alarm Permits, and Costs

The Dallas Police Department reported 6,184 burglaries to the FBI in 2024 and 5,633 in 2025, essentially flat from 6,196 in 2023 before a modest drop. Dallas's 2025 burglary rate of roughly 423 per 100,000 residents was roughly 1.8 times the verified national burglary rate of about 232 per 100,000. Dallas requires a security alarm permit if your alarm is audible or monitored for police response, at $50 a year for a residence, and the false alarm fee ladder starts on the fourth false alarm in a 12 month period.

Figures researched 2026-08-19; each source below carries its access date. Prices change; treat any price here as "as of" its date.

Burglary and property crime in Dallas

The Dallas Police Department reports through NIBRS and the FBI's Crime Data Explorer publishes its monthly counts. Summing those monthly actuals for the agency record gives the following.

Offense	2023	2024	2025
Burglary	6,196	6,184	5,633
Property crime (all)	52,637	45,101	40,936

Total property crime fell about 22 percent across the window while burglary fell about 9 percent, and burglary was flat between 2023 and 2024 before moving. That is the same pattern seen in several large Texas cities: the categories driving the property crime headline are not the ones a home alarm addresses.

As rates in the same CDE payload, DPD burglary ran roughly 475 per 100,000 residents in 2023, roughly 468 in 2024, and roughly 423 in 2025. The verified national burglary rate is roughly 232 per 100,000, so Dallas runs at roughly 1.8 times the national figure, below Houston and San Antonio in the same years. We checked these counts against the Dallas Police Department's own incident file on the Dallas open data portal, which gives 6,156 burglary offenses in 2023, 5,968 in 2024, and 5,563 in 2025. The two series agree within about 4 percent in every year and move in the same direction. The 2025 line is still provisional. Figures for the most recent year are subject to revision as agencies resubmit, so treat 2025 as the current published number rather than a final one.

Dallas alarm permits and the false alarm ladder

Dallas administers alarm registration through the Dallas Police Department's Alarm Permit Compliance Unit, with the online registration and payment service run under an agreement with a third-party administrator. The city's published rule is that a security alarm permit is required if you have a security alarm that is audible and/or monitored to provide police response. That wording matters: an audible-only system with no monitoring company is still covered.

The annual permit fee is $50 for a residence and $100 for a business. A permitted alarm site is allowed three free false burglar alarms in a twelve month period. After that the ladder is $50 each for the 4th, 5th, and 6th, $75 each for the 7th and 8th, and $100 each for the 9th and beyond.

Panic and holdup alarms are treated separately and, for a residence, flatly: all panic or holdup false alarms at a residence are $100 each, with no free allowance. Businesses face an escalating panic ladder starting at $100 and rising to $400 for the fourth and beyond. If your system has a panic button or a duress code that signals holdup, know where it is and make sure everyone in the household knows what it does, because there is no free first one at a Dallas residence.

What home security costs in Dallas

Equipment and monitoring are priced nationally. What changes locally is the permit and false alarm overhead described above. As of August 2026, SimpliSafe's published monitoring plans run 33 cents a day for self monitoring with camera recordings (about $10 a month), 76 cents a day for Standard professional monitoring (about $23 a month), $1.10 a day for Core (about $33 a month), and $1.66 to $2.66 a day for the Pro and Pro Plus tiers. Those are list prices from SimpliSafe's own plan page rather than promotional rates. SimpliSafe was running an Anniversary Sale that was ending around this date, so a lower number quoted elsewhere is probably a promotion with an expiry attached, and it is worth checking what the price reverts to. Other national providers ladder similarly.

Home security cost per month breaks down the full annual cost stack including equipment, monitoring, and the extras that get added later, and cheapest professional monitoring ranks the budget monitored plans by published pricing. If you are still deciding whether to pay for dispatch at all, is professional monitoring worth it walks the trade-off, and DIY vs professional monitoring cost does the arithmetic over a few years.

If you decide monitoring is worth paying for, our short questionnaire at /quote fetches real quotes from professional monitoring providers for your address. Budget the $50 annual city permit on top, and confirm with any provider that they will carry your permit number to dispatch.

A sensible setup for a Dallas home

Physical work first. Deadbolts with long screws into the framing rather than the jamb alone, reinforced strike plates, sliding door blocks, and a garage side door treated as a real exterior door rather than an afterthought. Alley-access rear entries are common in older Dallas neighbourhoods and they give a burglar cover, so lighting and a camera facing that approach earn their place.

Then detection. Entry sensors on ground floor doors and reachable windows, motion coverage on the main hallway, and a siren. Three free false burglar alarms a year sounds generous until a curtain over a vent or a pet on a couch starts a monthly pattern, so use pet-friendly motion sensors where relevant and place motion sensors away from air vents and windows that catch direct sun.

On the monitoring question specifically, Dallas is a city where the permit applies even to an audible-only system, which removes one of the usual arguments for going unmonitored. If you are weighing it, is professional monitoring worth it and best self-monitored systems with no monthly fee cover both sides, and subscription creep index covers what tends to get added to the monthly line after year one. Do security signs deter burglars covers the deterrence evidence honestly.

Frequently asked questions

How many burglaries does Dallas have?: The Dallas Police Department reported 6,184 burglaries in 2024 and 5,633 in 2025 through the FBI's Crime Data Explorer, against 6,196 in 2023. The department's own incident file gives 5,968 and 5,563 for the same two years, within about 4 percent. Total property crime fell from 52,637 in 2023 to 40,936 in 2025. The 2025 figures are provisional and subject to revision.
Do I need an alarm permit in Dallas?: Yes, if your security alarm is audible and/or monitored to provide police response. The city publishes an annual permit fee of $50 for a residence and $100 for a business, administered through the Dallas Police Department's Alarm Permit Compliance Unit.
What does a false alarm cost in Dallas?: A permitted alarm site gets three free false burglar alarms in a twelve month period. The 4th, 5th, and 6th are $50 each, the 7th and 8th are $75 each, and the 9th and beyond are $100 each. All panic or holdup false alarms at a residence are $100 each with no free allowance.
Is a self-monitored alarm exempt from the Dallas permit?: Not on the city's published wording. Dallas states a permit is required if you have a security alarm that is audible and/or monitored to provide police response, so an audible siren with no monitoring company still falls inside the requirement. Cameras alone are a different question and worth confirming with the city.

Sources

Dallas Police Department burglary counts 2023 (6,196), 2024 (6,184), 2025 (5,633) and property crime counts 2023 (52,637), 2024 (45,101), 2025 (40,936); agency, Texas, and US burglary rates per 100,000 from the same CDE payload. Agency ORI TXDPD0000.: https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/explorer/crime/crime-trend (accessed 2026-08-19)
Dallas Police Department incidents file, NIBRS burglary of a residence plus burglary of a business: 6,156 offenses in 2023, 5,968 in 2024, and 5,563 in 2025: https://www.dallasopendata.com/d/qv6i-rri7 (accessed 2026-08-19)
National burglary rate of roughly 232 per 100,000 residents (231.9): https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/LATEST/webapp/#/pages/explorer/crime/crime-trend (accessed 2026-08-19)
Dallas security alarm permit required if the alarm is audible and/or monitored to provide police response; annual permit fee $50 residence and $100 business; three free false burglar alarms in twelve months; 4th, 5th and 6th $50, 7th and 8th $75, 9th+ $100; all residential panic/holdup false alarms $100; business panic ladder $100 / $200 / $300 / $400+; program administered with a third-party administrator via dallasalarmpermit.com: https://dallascityhall.com/departments/waterutilities/special_collections/Pages/special_collections_registrations.aspx (accessed 2026-08-19)
SimpliSafe published monitoring plan prices: 33 cents/day self monitoring with camera recordings, 76 cents/day Standard, $1.10/day Core, $1.66 to $2.66/day Pro and Pro Plus, as of August 2026: https://support.simplisafe.com/pages/monitoring-plans (accessed 2026-08-19)