Portland police want to help homeowners to buck the latest burglary trends.

Empty recycle bins left on the sidewalk -for example- are a signal to thieves that someone may not be home, they say.

Lately, laptops computers have been a top prize for these opportunists.

Just ask dog trainer Kate Aromaa who now lives in Southeast Portland. The success of her dog-training business depends a lot on her computer.

"I check email probably three or four times a day," she explained.

When her laptop vanished from inside her house, "That was really bad. I had years and years of thousands of bookmarks and yeah, that was hard."

"Laptop computers are the real biggy," said Det. Dan Andrew, pouring over police burglary reports.

As he drives through parts of his Southeast precinct, Andrew looks for weak spots.

"Leaving a ladder in your yard, making things easy for thieves. Thieves are opportunists."

And when an opportunist sees a recycle bin left at the sidewalk, "It's like the big yellow beacon on the curb indicating that people might not be home from work yet," he said.

Maria Boyer is wise to this. The former identity theft victim is home for lunch and workers just emptied her bin a few minutes ago.

"Gonna be bringing in my recycling bin and my garbage can now that they've both been emptied," she said, carrying one container in each arm.

She and her neighbors are staying ahead of thieves by communicating with each other and looking out for each other.

"Just to keep everything looking like we're conscientious and that we're home."

While they're at it, says Andrew, homeowners should stop luring thieves to their front door by leaving valuables or recyclable cans on the porch.

He recommends an alarm system if you can afford one.

"Just having an alarm, there's an 80 to 90 percent less chance of being burglarized," he explained.

Kate's Aromaa's burglar had an easy way in.

But detective Andrew says the aggressive types who roam Portland neighborhoods from late morning until mid-afternoon don't care about locks and latches.

If they see a laptop, "They'll kick in a back door they'll kick in a front door. They'll throw a rock through a window," Andrew said.

"People just need to pay more attention to what they're doing," said Aromaa.   

After her hard-earned lesson, she says she'll never take her eyes of the new laptop she purchased.

Portland Police say they cannot stress enough how important it is for people to record their property's serial numbers.

Also, they say warn of another local trend: strangers coming to the front door, claiming to sell magazine subscriptions.

Detectives say they may instead be casing your home for future burglaries.