I never used to lock my car. We live in a quiet hum-drum townhouse complex where everyone knows everyone.
Then the kids in the neighbourhood started getting older. Now, since it is a quiet place with little to do, teenagers will come around and go through cars who’s doors are unlocked. It is worth the extra second so that my cheap sunglasses and children’s books are still there.
Considering “they” say many thefts occur due to people leaving their doors unlocked (not just with cars, but also homes), I most certainly lock mine.
As previously stated, many thieves are opportunist, and it’s not uncommon for them to just pull on random car door handles to see who has been careless enough to leave their car unlocked, thus giving them the chance to easily go through the vehicle.
Breaking a window? It’s happened to me, and it’s annoying, but also a lot more obvious. Insurance took care of it.
I have an uncle who used to do this, for just this reason. I’m not sure how well it worked, though.
When I had a convertible, it had a locking glove box and a secondary lock box for valuables behind the seats. I never worried about leaving the top down, I could lock anything “valuable” in those places. When I lived in the city with that car, I often left the empty glove box, consoles and rear lock box open to show potential thieves that there was nothing in the car.
i had a car stolen from in front of my house one night…in the middle of a snow storm. the car wasnt locked at the time.
i figured, what are the odds??
i lock my car at all times now.
I lock my doors while in the city but not usually at home or in a nearby small town.
While I somewhat agree that a determined thief will break windows, a casual thief would just open your unlocked door and steal your CDs/iPod, whatever and be gone in a few seconds.
Have you ever returned to your car to find the back seat full of zucchini?
That makes no sense. I mean, there are electric locks vs. manual locks, but if I’m leaving my car, the car does NOT lock itself. I have to use the remote and press a button.
Of course the button locks all 4 doors, not just 1. Is that what you meant?
I can’t imagine any car having doors that literally locked themselves whether you wanted it or not. Even the ones with the proximity keys that you don’t even have to fish out of your pocket: I suppose I could see them being set so that as soon as the key is more than ‘x’ feet away from the car, they self-lock, but that seems like a huge annoyance if you were, say, loading the car for a trip or something.
Oh - and like Lynn Bodoni, I once had a car where the doors would self-lock once I started driving the car. I could have disabled that but never bothered. My current car does not do this.
Re the poll: I nearly always lock my car doors when driving, and always lock them when not driving (except when in our garage). In fact I insist on electronic locks vs. manual because I like to be able to know that all 4 are locked. It’s a personal safety thing, when I’m driving, and a personal safety / property safety thing when it’s parked.
I know who the culprit was!
~whistles innocently while running away~
When I was a crime reporter, the most common form of theft was from unlocked cars. The thieves would just go down the street trying all the doors and steal from the unlocked ones. Why go to the bother of breaking windows?
I know someone who has a Mitsubishi Eclipse of around 2002 vintage that will lock itself, you have to be SURE to take the keys with you when you get out and shut the door. It’s made that way from the factory AFAIK, really dumb.
On a lot of current cars, if you use the remote to unlock the car, the car will automatically re-lock itself if you don’t open one of the doors within X seconds.
We always lock our car, and we never leave anything of value in it. Our locked car was broken into once in a parking garage in Colorado Springs. We lost a camera plus a lot of valuable pictures. 
if the car is not lock and some one take the radio or steal it out right i don’t think the insures pays if they find out. i do know that the rates go down the more theft deterrent you have
so i always lock
yeah this is true I hadnt thought of that good point I mean everyone like to save dough even when you losing dough locking doors can work
It depends on the car. I had a convertible roadster when I was in college, and I never locked it, because there was nothing in it that was more valuable to me than the top. I’d rather they steal my sunglasses and cheap radio and not slit my expensive ragtop.
Same for the Jeep Wrangler I had. I locked the center console when I left something in it, but never the doors.
I often leave stuff in my pickup truck that I wouldn’t want grabbed by an opportunistic thief, so I do lock that when I’m in town (but never in my own driveway).