We've lived in the house since 1997, and to the best of our knowledge, no one has intruded into our garage. Last night, our knowledge changed as our Ring doorbell camera on the back door noticed someone peeking inside and entering my garage at 3AM.
In the image, there are two people. One clear outline of a person in grey to the left of the garage, and part of another person in the doorway, where it's easier to make out a shoe and jacket than anything else. They're inside the garage at this point, seemingly going around the Jeep just inside. It's easier to see in the video as the gap in the door changes as the person moves. For the rest of the video, that right edge of the door is as straight as you'd expect a door edge to be, except when people are in the way. So at least two people were in my garage at 3AM.
I scrubbed forward and back from the noticed motion. The door wasn't open until moments before, and the camera didn't catch anyone else opening the door or entering the garage. The camera never caught any other activity inside (like lights or shadows in the windows), nor did it catch anyone leaving, even the person caught entering. We have a smart garage door opener, which alerts every time it is opened or closed, and it didn't alert during the wee hours.
After I woke and noticed the door open, and checked the above, I hit the garage door open button a couple times to open the door just some inches. This also turns the light on. No one inside moved or exited, as far as I could tell. I bonked the button again to shut the door, but instead it went up more, with the light flashing, as if the sensor caught something in the way of the closing door. I bonked the button again to stop it from rising and a last time to close it, and it closed without further incident. I don't think anyone was in there, as it didn't really open far enough for someone to sneak out of it, to be caught in my door closing attempt. There are plenty of leaves and things still blowing about, and the door seems to grumble sometimes regardless of whether there seems to be anything in the way; perhaps not 100% aligned sensors are to blame, or maybe they jiggle some when the door moves, even though it's a fresh install.
After a moment of contemplation and with a heavy sigh (as much because it's 1°F outside as the thought of running into anyone), I put on my shoes and jacket and went out with the dogs to investigate. They wanted to go out for bathroom reasons, as we generally do first thing in the morning. Of course the intruders left the gate open, too, but the dogs didn't try to run through it. I latched the gate and turned to check out the garage. The dogs joined me, because there were smells, it seems. There was a little excited sniffing (after peeing), but no other exciting activity. Nothing seemed amiss.
We're nearing the end of our garage rebuild, so it's essentially empty. The builders have removed all the scrap building materials and packaging left behind, leaving a small pile of dirt in the corner. The electricians haven't come in yet, so we need to leave the walls clear, meaning the stuff we'd normally pack into the garage is still strewn around the yard or piled somewhere in the house. The only things in the garage are a heavy ice scraper, a small step stool, and our Jeeps. There's an electrical extension cord running from the house to the garage so the garage door works, which has a big coil on the ground. Nothing seemed disturbed.
I anticipate they tried the doors on the Jeeps and looked for things worthy of quickly lifting. Finding both Jeeps locked and nothing else of value in the garage, they made their way back out to hit the next garage.
I poked at the Ring video again, and it looks like the caught intruder had been trying to move very slowly, possibly to avoid detection by motion sensors, but made the mistake of hopping over a patch of missing sidewalk to enter the garage. Whoever opened the door perhaps crept more carefully and wasn't detected at all. When not actively recording, the Ring gets a snapshot every 30 seconds. There are flickers of lights from other motion sensors around our garage (ours will have one, too, when complete), and what look like some headlamps making a couple skips down the alley. The lights don't mean too much, because animals set them off, but the headlamps aren't usually animals.
The Ring camera does a good job of identifying people versus other objects (although the occasional bug gets noted as a person), but seems to alert only on motion. I've noticed I can be on the back deck, in view of the doorbell, and not be seen by it as I sit more or less still in a chair doing whatever deck sitting things I do, only to get alerted again if I move too much. There's probably a speed, especially at range, where moving slowly enough doesn't appear like motion between cycles on the cameras.
I think the hop the dude made to get from where the snap shows his silhouette over the bit of rough dirt to the sidewalk in front of the door gave the Ring what it needed. It captures a little before the thing it noticed, so we can see him taking a couple slow, slow steps before turning and leaping, and then continuing carefully and slowly through the open door.
Because the garage is still being constructed, we can't really lock the door. As I typed this, a delivery arrived, probably for the electricity stuff, where he entered through that same door, opened the big door, dropped his stuff off, closed everything and left, all before I could get my shoes on to ask if I can get anything out of the way.
I'll probably lock the door for the next nights, just to try to deter more investigations, and possible loss of what I'm guessing is potentially expensive stuff since they're putting a separate panel and outlets and wires in. We're having the garage wired separately from the house with the idea that EVs will likely become more prevalent, and we'll need more power than the line from the house can offer. So there's more than just some wires and outlets going in.
I feel for anyone caught in a situation where they need to lift stuff from other people's garages for some scratch. I don't have a solution, but stealing the junk we keep in our garage isn't going to go far. Maybe when we put some of it back in, and there are a few yard tools, bikes, and the electric mower, but really nothing of value gets left in the garage.
When the construction is complete there will be a light over the big door with a motion sensor and camera. There will be lights on the garage in the yard, and a camera inside the garage, too. We used to use the camera to be able to double-check the garage door status, but now the opener can tell us; but we've still got a camera to use, so we'll use it. We'll also start locking the door on the regular.
