Posted on 08/28/2008 5:59:14 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Sue Wentz and her husband, Eugene, saved for five years, living in a modest home in a low-income neighborhood of Houston, before they broke ground in January on a 4,300-square-foot house on 12 acres in Magnolia, Tex., a woodsy suburb about 40 miles northwest of the city. They are overseeing the construction themselves to control costs. So it was with dismay that they arrived at the job site one morning in July to find that all the copper wiring and air-conditioning tubing had been ripped out of the rough frame of the house.
Besides the financial hit — $11,000 — the theft took a psychological toll. “I felt so violated, and now I don’t trust anyone,” said Ms. Wentz, who teaches English at a community college.
...
According to professional homebuilders, law enforcement officials and insurers, the Wentzes’ experience is not unique. Larceny at residential construction sites across the country has increased significantly in the last two years because of soaring prices of building materials like copper, lumber and cement, they said. The National Association of Home Builders, a trade group, estimates that the annual cost of theft to the industry has reached $5 billion. The problem has meant higher material and insurance costs for builders, who pass them along to buyers, sometimes to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars. In the end, that can add as much as 10 percent to the cost of a home, builders and developers said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Houston/Texas PING
And you know- it takes so much time and work to tear-out and sell the copper that they would be better off getting a JOB
If I were them, I'd replace the copper and set up my own personal 12-gauge sting operation.
This is nothing new. It’s very common for refrigerators, hardwood flooring, tools, plumbing fixtures, plain lumber, and other home components to grow legs and walk off a job site in the middle of the night. People are dishonest. Has nothing to do with the economy.
Hook up the power...
We had the aluminum outrigger pads stolen from one of our truck cranes. The thieves had to dig around the pads to remove them, potentially seriously destabilizing the crane. We’d have been sued if the crane tipped over and killed them.
Can’t win.
>>”...set up my own personal 12-gauge sting operation...”<<
I’d be compelled to do the same except that after the thieves sued me I’d end up working for them the rest of my life as they lived in my new home.
Shoot the lawyers, they are thieves too.
“People are dishonest. Has nothing to do with the economy.”
I don’t see them saying it’s the economy. Where did you get that?
“According to professional homebuilders, law enforcement officials and insurers, the Wentzes’ experience is not unique. Larceny at residential construction sites across the country has increased significantly in the last two years because of soaring prices of building materials like copper, lumber and cement, they said.”
Are you saying all these people lying, that worksite theft isn’t increasing?
On December 14, 2004 our house that was under construction was robbed. We had a shipping container that was locked with one of those round hardened security locks that are very hard to cut. Made little difference... The thief mostly took the carpenters power tools... Fortunate for me the job site itself was undamaged. There wasn’t any wiring or plumbing installed at that time.
I don’t think anyone said it had anything to do with the economy. It does have to do with the drastically increased cost/value of copper and other materials. The rewards of stealing copper and the like has increased dramatically over the last few years.
Most of these thieves are illegal aliens. This is big business in Mexico.
The building next to ours got hit one weekend. I think I even saw the thieves that Monday morning. 25K in wiring.
Around here, thieves are hitting SUVs with twin cats and sawing them off for the platinum.
I'd be very interested in tracking their politics, especially their views on law enforcement and the courts and comparing before theft and after theft attitudes.
But even builders who erect fences and install surveillance cameras are losing materials as thieves become bolder, or perhaps more desperate, in a weakened economy.
Ah. Bush's fault.
A few years ago, my neighbor, a custom home builder told me that they were constantly losing stuff. On one site, they were losing lots of dimensional lumber. He sent a couple guys into the woods to see what they could find. They found one awesome treehouse. He said it was so well built, he joked about hiring the kids for his crew...after they dismantled the treehouse and returned the wood.
Anyway, he learned how to keep and protect equipment. (Never know when someone will try to take the "keys" to an M1 tank and use them.)
He got a job as a site supervisor working for a construction company and his job site never had any equipment or diesel fuel stolen.
They put him in charge of overseeing all the job sites and thefts are down to once a month on all sites combined with only diesel fuel being taken.
And the "lengths" the thieves go to to siphon the fuel boggles the mind.
I don’t know if it’s increasing or not, and I am certainly not calling anyone a liar. I just know that it’s something that has always happened. My parents had trouble with this while building a house nearly half a century ago. Family members involved with a general contracting business 35 years ago had a lot of trouble with jobsite theft. We had trouble with it while building our house nearly 20 years ago. These events were in different parts of the US, too.
Oh I know it’s always happened, but it certainly makes sense that it’s increased since the price of so many metals has skyrocketed. Also happens more often in foreclosed homes now.
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