I, for one, will vouch for this tactic.

Quote:
Supposedly the most foolproof way to avoid theft is to drive a 20-year-old beat up car with nothing in it and leave it unlocked with windows partly open.


It wasn't 20 years old, but in the late 70's and 80's I had a rust bucket of a 64 VW van where the wind wing locks had broken off so I couldn't lock it anyway...and I never did. All the rust spots and holes were roughed up, patched, and sprayed with Rustolum to slow decomposition. Drove that thing from the tip of Baja to the Canadian Rockies burned up 2 engines and never had anything taken out of it. And sometimes it was left for weeks on end...although maybe it wasn't broken into out of pity....