I ended up buying a camera for peace of mind and for checking in on my place to see who's entering my residence area. Sometimes it's genuinely helpful.
Almost nowhere is "safe" from thieves. If you live in a "nice area" like any of the more expensive neighborhoods/cities in the bay area then you're very prone to burglary because go figure you likely have expensive stuff that's good for stealing. Unless you have really good defense mechanisms to detour/stop thieves (or just nothing worth stealing) then you're going to get stuff stolen.
Property crime isn't the same as violent crime.
If you're only interested in recording what happened (as evidence) an IP camera can run on PoE to a laptop or mini-pc on a UPS, and record for as long as you want, even in the case of a power outage if you include a UPS (an old laptop works well in this case - you can potentially just run the PoE switch/injector on the UPS and let the laptop run on its battery).
No internet connection required. No "service" to stop working. No "API" to become deprecated.
I'm not saying your solution is bad, my house has the same thing (with 4 cameras around the house), but most people don't want to spend time managing yet more stuff, and debugging their camera system if something goes wrong.
It's been useful for other things like checking in on. Where/when packages are delivered, when the landlord showed up, when a neighbor came over to tell us something but we didn't hear them knock on the door, finding out my smoke alarm was going off for no apparent reason, etc.
My neighborhood has had thefts too. I assume my two dogs barking have been enough to keep them at bay. It wouldn’t surprise me if statistically this holds true elsewhere. Low hanging fruit and all.
Have you considered a motion sensor tied to a speaker that plays dogs barking/rustling?
We already have a couple fake cameras on the property as deterrents that were installed by the landlord. I just happened to install a real one because I wanted a little evidence collection since I've been a victim of theft more than once in the bay area.
Thief thought bubble “this might hurt / don’t forget tasty treats”
Option 2: A half dozen visible cameras
Thief thought bubble “Good stuff inside / don’t forget hat and glasses”
The best piece of mind isn't a webcam and paranoia of people you don't recognize in your neighborhood, its a list of your valuables and appropriate renters/homeowners insurance to replace whatever might have been stolen.