I suspect it’s hard to actually consistently make 500$/day breaking into peoples homes. Most used things aren’t worth much and would be difficult to sell in bulk at anything close to what they cost.
That’s why people steal catalytic converters etc.
That’s why people steal catalytic converters etc.
IMO the cheapening of technology has made a difference with this. When my (then not yet) ex-wife was burglarized, Just her laptop and a camera gave the criminal 900$ at a pawn shop [0].
[0] - which BTW, fun thing about this, if your insurance covers 'replacement cost' you are better off not finding your items at a pawn shop. Most state laws are written such that as long as the pawn shop collects fingerprints/ID, the person who was stolen from can get their items back, but must pay the pawn shop back what they paid the thief for it. Insurance will happily pay that instead but still take your deductible out. (It worked out OK for me, the wedding ring was among the stolen items, never got pawned and that covered the deductible and then some... eventually helped pay for the lawyer lol)
This needs to be a full time job to make the $500/day though. Some houses are as you say now worth the bother, but others have things that can be sold. The key is you need to know what you can sell and for how much before you take it.
As the other poster said, the hard part is not getting caught. The easy places to sell these things (pawn shops, scrap yards) tend to ask for id - and the ones that accept a fake id will only take so much before they have to recognize you.
Without someone to take the risk and a sizable cut your best bet might be a few fake ID’s and a multi city spree of pawn shops. Though if you have access to high quality fake ID’s banks are probably a much better option.