Paving the Way to Your Pocket: Beware of Roving Repairmen Whose Real Specialty Is Crime

Illustration by Alex Nabaum

Stella Taratuski was sitting on her front step in Philadelphia one summer afternoon when two men in a pickup pulled into her driveway. Seems they noticed her curb was cracked, and they offered to fix it at a special deal.

“My sister asked how much,” Carmela Calandra recalls of that June day in 2006. “But before they would quote Stella a price [for the curb], one of them said he should also look at her driveway. Stella followed him … only to notice a few minutes later the other guy wasn’t around.”

Taratuski, now 85, a widow who has since moved to an assisted living community, went into her house and found the other “repairman” walking around. “He told her he needed to use the bathroom,” Calandra recalls.

Taratuski chased the men out, and they quickly drove off. Then she went into her bedroom and found that her jewelry was gone. “Her 11⁄2-carat engagement ring, wedding band and a few other pieces totaling $10,000—all stolen in an instant,” Calandra says.

The men were “Travelers”—part of a network of roving teams offering drive-by promises of cheap home repairs or pretending to be servicemen from local utility companies.

“They literally intermarry and create massive families of scammers that go from town to town, often preying on the elderly,” says Amanda Schlaffer, who tracks Traveler scams for the Texas Department of Public Safety. “They usually work in teams, offering to do paving and roofing repairs, painting, cleaning or others jobs.”

Their work is shoddy. They may use watered-down paint, or oil as driveway sealant that washes away in the first rain. But much of the time the real goal is to get inside the house to steal your valuables, Schlaffer says.

These “repairmen” often come from the South and travel north and west during spring and summer. Other groups are based in Texas, Oklahoma and Ohio.

Travelers like to stress that the repair must be made immediately, says Ellis Levinson, author of Hiring Contractors Without Going Through Hell. “After they start, they jack up the price, saying, ‘What we quoted you was only for labor. Materials are extra.’ When homeowners object, these people can be intimidating.”

Your primary defense: Understand that legitimate repairmen and contractors don’t knock on your door looking for business. “And good, reputable contractors are so busy, they never quote low-ball prices for their work,” says Schlaffer.

Some other tips for spotting Travelers:

Look. Their trucks typically have out-of-state plates; if they have a business name, it’s usually a generic one such as “Asphalt Paving” or “Do It Rite Paving,” spelled out in stick-on vinyl lettering. Some trucks haul a trailer.

Listen. Officials say Travelers often speak in a cant, a secret language; have used last names including Small, Harrison, Galvin, Holden, Stanley and Cooper; and claim an Irish, Scottish, English, German or Romanian heritage.

Learn. They often return to the same area year after year. In many states legitimate contractors carry their licenses, but Travelers rarely have them. If approached by a drive-by repairman, immediately call the police.

For more information on Travelers, go online to the Office of the District Attorney for Colorado’s 4th Judicial District, at dao2.elpasoco.com, click on “Consumer Alerts and Tips” and then on “Gypsies or Travelers—Home Repair.”