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So thieves broke into your storage unit again

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Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#291

Post by bigiain »

FinnKuhn wrote: post #250
ebiester wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there are three use cases: 1. You are temporarily moving to a place outside your local area, or to a much smaller place. I was moving around for a year and a half, so I left my furniture and non-valuables in a storage unit until I would be settled again. 2. You live in a small unit in a big city. $100-$150 for an extra 50 square feet a month might be cheaper than the equivalent space and is a great choice for…

I could also see seasonal storage for things that you might not want to leave outside for 1-2 months a year.

Lots of Burningman groups and theme camps pay for storage for the 50 weeks a year their camp stuff isn't needed.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#292

Post by elzbardico »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #62

I’m stunned by the idea of making the pawn shop whole. As I understand UK law, if you buy stolen goods, the original owner can just claim it back and you take the loss - simply to discourage buying with knowledge it was stolen. I guess the pawn shop would go out of business but it does seem if you let them act as a fence you are solving for the wrong problem

On Brazil if you are caught with stolen goods there's a specific section of the penal code for that and you will could go to jail. Now, police is severly underfunded in Brazil and enforcement is a joke, but the law is severe, and sometimes some junkyard owner is arrested because of it.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#293

Post by smugma »

FinnKuhn wrote: post #250
ebiester wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there are three use cases: 1. You are temporarily moving to a place outside your local area, or to a much smaller place. I was moving around for a year and a half, so I left my furniture and non-valuables in a storage unit until I would be settled again. 2. You live in a small unit in a big city. $100-$150 for an extra 50 square feet a month might be cheaper than the equivalent space and is a great choice for…

I could also see seasonal storage for things that you might not want to leave outside for 1-2 months a year.

I was driving in the burbs yesterday and saw a giant skeleton… like 13’ tall and the skull being 2’ wide. I said to my friend “where do they store that stuff? I’m guessing their Christmas lawn stuff is just as extreme.”

a lot of people love their holiday decor. Not how much resale you can get on a giant skeleton, but it’s not an easy lift. Seems like a good use case for storage… a few thousand a year to make you happy thinking you’re bringing holiday cheer to neighbors and kids.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#294

Post by qwertycrackers »

tshaddox wrote: post #252
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why it isn't true of your home. The cost of storing an item in your home (assuming you didn't buy a bigger house just to store the thing) is 0.

My point was that you could try to think of your storage unit as if the size and monthly cost of your home was more flexible, i.e. you can just pay 2% per month for 2% more space. When you chose your house there were presumably several options with different amounts of storage space at different price points. You could just treat the addition of a storage unit as increased granularity between those housing options.

Storage space is really just tacked proportional to bedrooms, for the most part. My house has what feels like a bunch of extra space because I wanted enough bedrooms for my family. They didn't need to come with so much extra, that's just how they build homes with more than a few bedrooms now.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#295

Post by ShakataGaNai »

jwagenet wrote: post #152
bodyfour wrote: post #38

What is annoying to me is that in this internet-connected age, the storage units I see still don't have better per-unit security. Just a phone alert to say "door to unit #xyz has been opened" would be a huge improvement. Wire up a cheap webcam for extra credit.

I’m pretty sure most large storage operations (U-Haul, extra space, etc) have per unit door sensors which work in concert with customer check in/out to verify authorized openings.

The local storage operation I use has exactly that. If you do not "badge in" and open a door - the alarm goes off. When the manager was showing me the unit he said "Hey, an alarm is going to go off when I open this door - don't be surprised" and explained the system.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#296

Post by js8 »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #238
js8 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're talking about is a market failure, basically admitting that markets don't decrease prices in many cases. Which is a much deeper rabbit hole. My proposal even doesn't say what the ratio should be. If there wasn't legally defined maximal price margin (say 20%), I don't see what it would change in your argument - the companies would be free to ask for even more. Conversely, there is nothing that prevents the…

I don't know if I'd call it a market failure or a regulatory failure, or where the line is defined in the economic literature. The difference between a cap system and a uncapped system is the incentive to increase the base price as well.

There is an incentive for companies to increase prices, regardless of the price cap, aka "profit motive". That we can agree on.

My question is about the incentive to decrease prices (e.g. due to competition). Why it should be affected by the price cap? That's what you need to explain.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#297

Post by smeeger »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #218
peppermint_gum wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then I'm not sure what you mean by "deterrence". Both of the linked articles argue against increasing the severity of punishment, but they also say that the certainty of getting caught is a strong deterrent. This doesn't seem to be in conflict with what the GP said ("supporting laws and politicians that catch and punish criminals effectively"). It seems to me that many people have a problem with thieves not being pun…

Most of the people I have read or heard advocate for "more effective handling of crime" are much bigger on the severity of the sentence, though I don't deny that many will mention both. The "N strikes and you're out" angle, for example, is all about the severity of the sentence once you reach N. New HN commenter "smeeger" whose subthread we are in seems close to favoring violence as punishment for relatively minor cr…

ive been commenting here since 2014 but have to constantly make new accounts because HN bans me for expressing problematic beliefs. the fact that this thread got through the filter feels like a miracle or a dream… you need to read more carefully. i used the word effectively for a very specific reason. even the insanely sympathetic and humane punishments on the books in western countries now would basically stop crime if they were applied and implemented properly. if punishment were actually likely. if prisons werent just boot camp for criminals. social clubs. prisoners emerge from prison emboldened, not humbled. our system is broken and it stays broken because people are crappy. recently i actually decided to stop caring because its so pointless.

oh and your hands are waving a lot more than mine… you clearly dont want to think too hard about this

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#298

Post by lazide »

praptak wrote: post #222
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If it kills someone or causes grievous bodily harm, it's still on you. Yes, even if it's a burglar. Honestly, the laws in your locale are unjust and need to be rewritten. There should be absolutely no liability to the owner (or renter) of a property if someone burglarizing it gets hurt accidentally.

Well it kind of depends on what exactly happened. For example there are building codes, like "no deadly drops without guardrails". If you leave something like this then you are breaking the law. If somebody dies because of this then it's on you, even if they were breaking another law . I'm not sure how you could rewrite self defense law to cover this case.

Notably though, it’s usually civil law. So someone would have to have standing to sue (typically family). And typically more of an attractive nuisance type deal.

So it’s of the sort of thing where if someone is in your house, and falls off something and hurts themselves because of something negligent you did or whatever, then yeah they can sue for damages. Regardless of if they had your permission to be there, because you had a duty to not leave something obviously dangerous just lying there.

But it does lead to a lot of weird/unjust situations - either if the law does exist, or if it doesn’t.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#299

Post by analog31 »

ebiester wrote: post #207
istjohn wrote: post #159

The storage unit industry is one of the most awful, customer hostile industries I've encountered. It's impossible to get the local facility on the phone, publicly listed phone numbers are all redirected to a national call center where reps are unable to even accurately quote prices. TFA covers the insurance kickback scam. Then after I moved into my unit, I discovered 75% of the units in my facility could be broken in…

I think there are three use cases: 1. You are temporarily moving to a place outside your local area, or to a much smaller place. I was moving around for a year and a half, so I left my furniture and non-valuables in a storage unit until I would be settled again. 2. You live in a small unit in a big city. $100-$150 for an extra 50 square feet a month might be cheaper than the equivalent space and is a great choice for…

6. You're homeless, and have a place to sleep, but not for your stuff. Maybe you have bad credit, an eviction record, whatever. A small amount of cash income is enough to pay the rent on the storage unit.

7. You're storing the tools / materials for a small business.

Re: So thieves broke into your storage unit again

#300

Post by pmarreck »

FartinMowler wrote: post #241
mycall wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

4. Liveaboard who wants to keep some stuff on land just in case a boat sinks.

Wow, that's a somewhat rare edge case. Let me see if I can beat that (hold my beer): 5. Astronauts for Boeing Starliners who are not certain when their return flight will be.

I live in a boating town and there's a whole line of houseboats in one of the marinas, the others have plenty of boats that people seem to be living on board. No property taxes and the marinas always have bath/shower (and sometimes laundry) facilities; portable relatively efficient refrigerators now exist that can be either shore or battery powered, etc.

Undoubtedly, some of these rent storage facilities.

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