<p>Yep, happened at dark. She had run in for a coffee. Didn’t notice until she was in car.</p>
<p>In north Jersey, we usually lock the door (though have been known to leave back or cellar unlocked for days by accident.)</p>
<p>When we get to our more rural place, we usually never lock the door, whether we’re home or not. It’s just simpler. hasn’t been a problem yet.</p>
<p>After working in the DV shelter, I always look in my car before I open the door. It’s just a habit. </p>
<p>I will lock my car when I’m in a parking lot out of habit (I do not have automatic locks so my other three doors are always locked anyway). In my driveway, not so much. </p>
<p>FWIW- the two cars that I had stolen out of my driveway were both locked and one had an alarm. We were at a Tigers’ game at the time so it was in broad daylight. The alarm did not deter them nor did it cause anyone else to call the cops.
The car that my dad had stolen in Detroit- twice- (yes, same car) was dumped once because of OnStar (when they see the OnStar they will dump the car immediately because it’s not worth it) and then was completely burned and gutted because of a lack of OnStar (we only had it for a year- came with the car). It was locked and alarmed. </p>
<p>I do understand the perks of OnStar. Just, IME, the alarm and locking doesn’t do much of anything. </p>
<p>My car isn’t OnStar or alarm equipped and I’m not paying for it.</p>
<p>I will never NOT lock my doors. There’s been too many occurs where people slide in to carjack/rape/assault/rob you that I will lock my cars. I know that based on the hours that I worked during the past school year, leaving my car unlocked would be asking for it be stolen or be someone’s sleeping spot!</p>
<p>I’ve always preferred hidden or not so flashy tracking devices in comparison to OnStar. When carjackers see the button, they know they’re time is limited.</p>
<p>Niquii, the button has nothing to do with it. They’ll hit it and see if it’s active. </p>
<p>The button was still in my dad’s car when it was taken the second time but it wasn’t active so they just kept going. </p>
<p>Oh, the kicker to this story- when my dad called the cops in Detroit they told them that they don’t come to the scene unless there are guns involved AND they interrogated him when he went to go make a report. Lovely.</p>
<p>There’s an etiquette forum where this topic has been discussed a good deal. The consensus (or official line) was that it’s not the least bit rude to refuse to answer one’s door, whether the person ringing the bell is a stranger or just someone who dropped by without calling first. Some people were relieved to learn that; I really didn’t care. Not only does safety trump etiquette (a common saying on that board), but I don’t feel obliged to drop what I’m doing to suit someone else’s convenience/agenda when they couldn’t bother to call ahead to see if a visit was convenient. Besides, as others mentioned before, I’m also rarely dressed appropriately to see visitors if I’m not expecting someone.</p>
<p>Even in our gated community, we get solicitations. Businesses that gain access legitimately to do lawn work, or whatever, for other residents will sometimes abuse their access by going door to door. If multiple neighbors complain about a company doing that, the business is given a warning by our neighborhood mgt. coordinator. Repeat violations will get a business banned. The only religious proselytizing I’ve experienced here was from a neighbor who caught me hanging decorations outside one December.</p>
<p>We have an alarm system, which we use when we’re at home as well as when away. We also installed a camera system and it’s been great. Mostly, it’s been handy to check on UPS/FedEx deliveries, but it also caught a pest control guy lying about doing a treatment and provided evidence of a theft to our sheriff’s office last year.</p>
<p>Ok, romani. What I said still stands whether you agree with it or not. </p>
<p>I prefer hidden trackers. Let the robbers think they have more time in their hands than they do.</p>
<p>Yes, Niquii, I said the button is still there… but the button is NOT what is important. It’s when they push the button and they get a response indicating it’s active that’s important.</p>
<p>Silpat, you just taught me a new word: proselytizing! I’m glad my neighborhood isn’t the only one who has a neighbor going around. Last year they had a display claiming why Christianity was evil and the HOA banned them from putting up decorations on their house. :eek:</p>
<p>And to romani, I believe the button is important. Simple enough. It shouldn’t bother you and it’s no use to go back and forth over the importance of a button.</p>
<p>You’re the one that wants to be safe. I’m just telling you what I know from personal experience and from what the Detroit cops told us. </p>
<p>As I said, I don’t care what other people do. I will stop now :)</p>
<p>On both sides. In FL we live in a gated community and I always have the alarm set. I never answer the doorbell if I am not expecting someone. I put my purse out of sight as soon as I walk in the door. In NH we don’t lock the door, heck we don’t even close it at night unless there are reports of bears in the area. We leave the keys in the cars and the boat. We don’t have a doorbell so that takes care of that problem. Between the dog patrolling the yard and a very long gravel drive nobody gets to the door unannounced. Besides our house is so hard to find, even people we want there don’t always make it.</p>
<p>I must live in a blessed neighborhood or one still stuck in the fifties, because I don’t seem to have developed a bunker mentality. I can’t think of a time in the past year when my doorbell rang when it wasn’t someone I expected, a trick-or-treater, or the Fedex guy. Every couple of years we’ll get some earnest young type wanting a signature on a petition for a green initiative that will never happen, but that’s about it. So yes, I answer the bell. What is it people fear about answering the door–a push-in robbery? What are the chances? Probably as high as a carjacking, but I still drive every day.</p>
<p>Good for you, MommaJ. </p>
<p>Glad you live in a nice area where you do not have to worry like others here. </p>
<p>Burglaries happen, robberies happen, home invasions happen, sexual assaults through opened windows and unlocked doors, regardless if whether you have a bunker mentality or not. </p>
<p>We all do what we think is best. </p>
<p>For me, that is locking my door. My car doors, too, even when driving. Because, yes, that one time someone grabbed my door handle while I was at an intersection at a stoplightwasn’t because he was trying to valet my car for me. </p>
<p>We all live with our own risk analysis deciding what to do. Mine is to err on side of protecting my home people who aren’t delivering me packages and be wary. Your mileage will definitely differ. </p>
<p>I live near a big city off a major highway. Most bad things avoid us. Yet, there are bad things that have happened, to people I knew. So, that does influence my decisions quite a lot.</p>
<p>I do the sneaky thing and try to peer outside to see who it is. Makes it kind of hard because we have two huge windows covered by thin curtains and our door has glass in the middle of it. </p>
<p>I don’t like answering the door. Maybe I was raised to be too suspicious. </p>
<p>Also, I don’t want to deal with company or people looking for my parents. </p>
<p>My dog barks uncontrollably no matter who it is.</p>
<p>If you leave your car unlocked, keep in mind that you might have the button that opens your garage in that car. If you also have a GPS in the car, then even if it is stolen somewhere else, the GPS can take the car thief right to your home where they can then use the garage door opener. </p>
<p>I don’t answer the door if I don’t know or expect the person. We have a no soliciting sign for our neighborhood and by our door, but we still get people coming by to sell services, etc.</p>
<p>I keep all my doors locked, all the time.</p>
<p>I always answer my door if I’m home and dressed. I don’t always open the storm door, though. But I think it is good karma to at least politely say I’m not interested. I’d hope that if one of my kids was in trouble and rang a doorbell someone would at least answer and offer to call for help for them. I’d do the same. (Wouldn’t let a stranger in, but I’d offer to make a call.)</p>
<p>Our county has regulations for door to door solicitors. They have to have identification and a permit, which needs to be in plain sight. They always ring the doorbell and then step back off the porch onto the front walk. I’ve never been afraid to answer the door, although if I saw a stranger standing right next to the door, I might not answer.</p>
<p>Our neighbors left their garage door open and back door unlocked one night and woke up to find that someone had stepped into their back door, where they found carkeys, wallet and laptop conveniently set on the kitchen table. They took all of it, plus the car.</p>
<p>They drove through the neighborhood until they found another car, same make, same model, same color, where they swapped the tags. </p>
<p>The car was used for a drug run down I95. It was eventually recovered in a swamp in southern Florida, and the robbers/drug runners were arrested.</p>
<p>I lock my doors at night and generally if I’m home alone. However, my dogs would bark so loudly that they’d scare off any bad guys.</p>
<p>I also keep my cars locked even when they’re just sitting in my driveway. A neighbor once found in the morning that her unlocked car smelled like cigarettes. Apparently someone had climbed in the car during the night, sat there and had a few smokes. That would totally creep me out.</p>
<p>A couple of years ago, we had our front door open with the screen door closed tightly. the newspaper lady walked right in without knocking while I was cooking dinner and the dog scratched her ankles all up. Thankfully, he didn’t bite her but he could have because we didn’t know she was there until she started screaming. I never leave the door unlocked anymore.</p>
<p>We’ve had small stuff taken from our car in the driveway when it was unlocked. We live perpendicular to a street with shops and restaurants and bars, although a bit farther down. Sometimes there are events in the neighborhood and there can be a lot of young people wandering the neighborhood after they have been drinking and acting up.</p>
<p>No, I don’t.</p>
<p>Timely topic. I just moved to a small development in town. Was in the country prior and no one ever came to the door unless we were expecting them. This move was a big change for me and part of a healing, moving forward phase in my life. I’m trying to be more deliberate in my life, and with the move came this very same question. Here we get all sorts of door to door solicitation-anything from scouts selling stuff to the scam artist looking for a hand out. I decided I have the choice of whether to answer or not. My dogs bark loudly regardless so it affords me the option to peek out my peephole and decide on a case by case. If I dont know them, I dont answer. My blinds are drawn, my car in the garage, all doors locked, so you cant tell if anyone is home or not. it feels odd to not answer just like it feels odd not to pick up the phone each and every time it rings. But…</p>