Bat boxes (or bat houses) are a cost-effective initiative that increases the likelihood of attracting bats to your property, and thereby decreasing the number of insects in your area. Urban residents, lodge or recreational venue owners and farmers, can all benefit greatly from having inhabited bat houses on their properties. It is a cheaper and more environmentally friendly way of helping to keep insect populations under control as opposed to the continual use of poisonous chemicals that, apart from being illegal, do not provide an effective long-term solution. If bats living in the roof of a house are poisoned and die, new bats will simply take their place, and therefore it is preferable rather to bat-proof the roof and provide alternative housing for the bats.