Rash of breaking into parked cars

[Omaha Steve]

The current rage is bust out a window. Grab the garage door remote and the registration papers. They now have your address in most cases. So now they also have a way into a home. Most people don't lock the door to get into the house from the garage. If you don't have a security system on the home....

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Sometimes having an old-fashioned detached garage isn't so bad...

[Liberal_in_LA]

9. yep

[Dale Neiburg]

12. Some of us opt for the ultimate in security.

We don't have a garage at all.

[Eleanors38]

15. Yep. I have a carport & defective car door opener.

[hunter]

2. It's long been the way gangsters get guns in my city. They'll steal entire gun safes.

I don't have a garage door opener, accessible guns, and I don't lock my cars because replacing car windows always pisses me off.

Dumb-ass, the doors were unlocked!

There's no shit in my cars worth stealing, the cars themselves are not worth stealing, they''re not even attractive for a Dirty Mike orgy.

[ChazII]

3. Ahhh...the joys of a carport

no storage but anyone and everyone can see your car as well as anyone who doesn't belong to the car.

At least in my neighborhood where we know our neighbors.

[rickford66]

4. It's a good thing some of us raise our garage doors manually.

[Liberal_in_LA]

10. old school

[pnwmom]

5. Good lesson: bring your remote inside and keep it with your car keys.

That way no one can take it while you're sleeping.

We had a 3rd vehicle broken into on our driveway, and it must have been a disappointment. Crummy radio, no GPS, and no remote. They left the registration papers -- that was something we checked.

[Lochloosa]

6. I have two dogs. Come on in.

[Omaha Steve]

7. Check out this video

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017214997

[Silent3]

8. I didn't realize until now that having my garage door opener integrated into my new car...

...was not merely convenient, but a kind of safety feature too.

I didn't want to pay nearly thousand dollars for a moon roof, and for some odd reason the programmable door opener system for my car and the moon roof went together as one package, so I was fully prepared not to get either.

To cut a long story short, however, a custom order for a car without the moon roof/door opener fell through. I ended up getting a discounted deal on a car that had everything I wanted plus the moon roof and door opener, and now I have one more reason to be happy things turned out that way. My door opener isn't a stealable item now -- it's too integrated with the car's systems to pull it out without destroying it.

I suppose there are more sophisticated thieves out there who carry programmable door openers of their own, and they could program one of their openers from my built-in opener, but I imagine anyone that sophisticated is both much less common and harder to protect yourself against in many other ways when they do strike.

[Blue_Tires]

11. Please, let them come into my garage to steal my junk

they'll be doing me a favor...

[MineralMan]

13. If they break into my detached garage,

I hope they haul a bunch of stuff out of there so I can park my car in the garage this winter. It would save me a bunch of work.

[hobbit709]

14. My garage is full of junk and manually bolted.

And if they got in the house, there'd be 250 lbs of teeth and fur waiting on them

[ScreamingMeemie]

16. This sounds kind of "Snopesy" to me. One, many states (mine included) have a registration

sticker (with no address on it) and no papers to put in the glove box. Two, if a thief is going to rob your home, they aren't going to use a garage door opener; they'll go around back and bust in that way.

Is there a news article detailing this? I don't mean to be offensive, but this doesn't seem like it would be worth the trouble for the thief.

On edit, this is good advice for older cars that don't have coded garage door openers that came with their cars or those who don't live in Texas.

[Omaha Steve]

17. I work for the Omaha Police Dept.

Marta got an email from her employer about several cars in the parking garage that this happened to.

Nebraska registrations have the home address (a few have a business) on a bright pink paper easy to spot when your in a hurry to grab and run.

Both our cars are 09's, and have an opener in them. We have a security system that is monitored (by net, phone,and cell) has web cameras on the portal 24/7, nosy neighbors, and 3 dedicated dogs.

OS

[ScreamingMeemie]

18. Ahhhh... I see. Thanks for the clarification.

Nebraska should consider sticker registrations. Ours just have the year and a code on them if you're stopped. Be safe!

[Omaha Steve]

19. We do have a color coded (by year) sticker on the license plate

But you must have the registration and PAPER proof of insurance in the vehicle. Your proof on a smart phone is not valid yet.

I think Nebraska screwed up when it went to a system of you have the title, you can claim you bought the car without a notarized sellers signature. That has caused lots and lots of problems.

[ScreamingMeemie]

20. That stinks. MI had the year sticker on the license plate.

This is a ID-card-sized thing in the lower left corner, above our stupid safety inspection stickers. Drivers are encouraged here (taking my son through Drivers Ed) to keep insurance ID on their person not in their car for safety reasons.

That does sound like it would cause a lot of troubles.

[Omaha Steve]

21. Nebraska eliminated safety stickers and Omaha eliminated the wheel tax stickers years ago

When I take out our 57 Chevy, people ask what those old stickers are for???

[ScreamingMeemie]

22. TX's safety inspections are a joke—it depends upon where you take your car.

Michigan did not have safety inspections; they just had the emissions testing, which was abandoned years ago as well.