It’s tough to fathom just how desperate some people can be.
But there are a ton of people in our society who are just so desperate. Often, that comes with socioeconomic factors they had no control over. And there other circumstances like addiction and mental health issues that drive people to do desperate things. Lately, some of those folks have been targeting the HVAC equipment outside of residential homes. This is very much of the smash and grab sort of burglary. But it’s happening nonetheless. Thieves are actually ripping apart the HVAC equipment that sits alongside the house. This is the HVAC equipment that sits inside a cabinet and is part of the heat pump system. There are thousands of dollars worth of valuable HVAC components inside these cabinets. When I first heard about this sort of theft, I thought perhaps they were pulling out compressors or other such HVAC equipment. But that’s not the case at all. Instead, they’re destroying all of that HVAC equipment simply to get their hands on a small amount of copper. HVAC equipment comes with lots of small copper fittings and other copper tubing. These HVAC equipment thieves simply rip apart the HVAC cabinet in order to get their hands on that little bit of copper. Then they get ripped off by unscrupulous buyers who pay them pennies on the dollar. While I feel for these folks, I’ve taken steps to secure my HVAC equipment. I now have a reinforced steel cage that fits over the HVAC cabinet and locks down to the concrete pad underneath.