The repo man taketh away

Shawn Caragher poses for a portrait amongst some of the property his Fox Lake business, Advanced Recovery Inc., has recently repossessed. (Travis Haughton photo)

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Shawn Caragher is a “repo man.”

“It’s like stealing, but it’s legal,” said Caragher, operations manager and owner of Advanced Recovery Inc. based in Fox Lake.

“A guy walks outside, sees his car missing, and freaks out,” Caragher said. “He runs back inside, saying, ‘My car was stolen!’ I call him and say: ‘Hey, your car wasn’t stolen. Call your bank.’ ”

The auto industry has its own subprime-lending mess, with lenders extending longer, costlier loans to people unable to keep up with their payments, MSN Money.com said.

About 1.5 million vehicles were repossessed in 2007, a 10 percent increase over 2006. Some experts are predicting a 10 percent increase in 2008, according to Bankrate.com.    

 Caragher said he had sympathy for about 10 percent of the people from whom he repossesses property, people who unexpectedly have lost their jobs or have experienced some other devastating loss that leaves them strapped for cash.

But most of the people he takes property from are in over their heads and they know it, he said.

Caragher repossess anything – luxury yachts from people posing as millionaires, backhoes from construction workers who are away at lunch. Once, he took a semi at a truck stop while the driver was inside taking a shower.  

He has a computer to render key codes and transponder codes, and he uses a slim-jim to get into locked vehicles.

Click here to see video of the Repo man.

Most of his work is done at night.

“It’s easier when people are sleeping,” Caragher said. “There is the element of surprise.”

Vehicles usually are towed away and auctioned off. He has six men working for him.

Caragher usually takes 25 to 30 vehicles a week, he said, but that number dropped recently because of the economic stimulus checks that were issued by the federal government.

In Lake in the Hills, an average of two to three automobiles are repossessed each week, said James Wales, director of police and public safety.

“We recommend that they alert us,” Wales said. “They usually come in here and show us their papers. It’s the prudent thing because if we get a call from a resident telling us that someone is stealing their car, we’re apt to take it seriously.”

In Crystal Lake, about one car a month is repossessed, Deputy Chief Dennis Harris said.

“That’s the number we know of,” Harris said. “There is no legal requirement that the recovery agent checks in with us.”

The job was more like an action-packed movie decades ago. Now it’s more mundane, Caragher said, but he still loves what he does.

“When I first started about 20 years ago, it was a little violent,” Caragher said. “I’ve been shot at, been in some tense situations. But nowadays, you see the same people. These same people use different finance companies to get automobiles. They know you by name and give you the keys when you go to pick up the car and laugh about it. And they go out and buy another car the next day. There is always somebody that will sell you a car. It’s a game.”

The 10 percent Caragher feels sorry for are those who, through a series of unfortunate circumstances, find themselves behind on their bills.  

Caragher has advice for them: Maintain an open line of communication with creditors.

“Talk to the bank,” Caragher said. “Let them know what your situation is. Tell them you’re having a hard time.”

Caragher said that it’s when a customer stops talking to creditors that he’s hired to retrieve property.

Virginia Peschke, executive director with the Consumer Credit Counseling of McHenry County, said bankers are humans who can be swayed by a sad story.

“It’s a known fact that some people who are behind on their bills stop answering the phone and stop opening mail,” Peschke said. “I’ve counseled people who said they didn’t believe it would happen, that their cars would be repossessed. But they would park their cars in different places where they thought guys from the bank couldn’t find it.

“Talk to the lender,” Peschke said. “We have this image in our head that a banker is like Snidely Whiplash and he’s tying us to the railroad tracks. In reality, the bank doesn’t want the car. They want the money.”

Peschke said a normal reaction was to retreat into a shell. But she warned against it.

“Maybe you can work out a deal where the payments you missed could be tacked onto the end,” Peschke said. “People have told me stuff like, ‘Gee, I didn’t know you were going to take it on Thursday because I was going to pay you on Friday.’ ”

In these hard economic times, Caragher said he was experiencing a downturn in business with too many repossessed automobiles on the market. They are not moving at car auctions.

Caragher gets a flat rate of $350 to $400 for every car he takes, he said. He gets a lot more for an airplane that he repossesses because he has to hire a bank-approved pilot with insurance to fly the plane.

The repo man likes his job and lives by a credo.

“You give the people respect, and 95 percent of the time you get that respect back,” Caragher said.

“People say: ‘Hey, you were fair to me. It was nice meeting you. But I sure hope that I never see you again.’ ”