(MONEY Magazine) – Forget Cary Grant's elegant cat burglar in To Catch a Thief. The real burglar who raids your home is likely to be the criminal equivalent of a working stiff, as Derek T. Dingle's interview with one such pro -- we'll call him Tony Martin -- reveals. Active intermittently since 1974 (except for 10 years in prison on three burglary convictions), Martin, 45, says he's looted over 250 homes -- sometimes working alone, sometimes with his girlfriend -- in the medium-size sunbelt city where he lives. He's netted close to $1 million but has never gotten rich: ''I spend half the money on drugs and the rest on living expenses, so I have nothing to show for it.'' Martin claims not to be currently engaged in what he calls the trade. But he recently lost his job as a laborer and won't rule out taking up the trade again.

Q. HOW DO YOU SELECT TARGETS? A. We like rural homes because they're secluded, but we hit city houses too if they're surrounded by trees or anything that blocks a neighbor's view. Whenever we burglarize a place, we keep our eyes out for other homes to hit. A few weeks later, we come back and rob them too.

Q. WHAT TYPE OF PEOPLE DO YOU HIT? A. Middle income or higher. We want to go places where we can make a solid score. We're looking for homes with guns, VCRs and two or three TV sets.

Q. HOW DO YOU OPERATE? A. My girlfriend knocks on the door. If somebody answers, she asks for directions or acts as if she went to the wrong address. But if nobody's home, we park in the garage, close the garage door and then break down the door leading to the home. Once inside, my girlfriend looks in closets, dressers and under mattresses for jewelry, cash and guns. I grab microwave ovens, television sets, VCRs and stereo equipment. We never stay longer than 10 minutes.

Q. WHAT TIME OF DAY DO YOU WORK? A. Mostly the morning. It's simpler than at night, since the kids are in school and the parents are at work.

Q. WHAT IF SOMEONE COMES HOME? A. Once my girlfriend and I were in the driveway of a house we'd burgled when the owner drove up behind us. My girlfriend tried to convince her she was looking for someone. But then the woman spotted me, got scared and took off. She got my license plate number, though. That was one time I got caught.

Q. WHAT HAPPENS TO THE PROPERTY? A. I sell it to fences. Many of them are also drug dealers. Sometimes they resell it to average citizens but mostly they trade it for drugs. A lot of it winds up in Mexico. One fence I used to work for would load the stolen merchandise into a dump truck, cover it with dirt, and pretend to be hauling dirt to Mexico for road construction.

Q. HOW MUCH DO YOU GET PAID? A. For a 19-inch television, anywhere from $75 to $100; for a VCR, about $100. For a .38 special or .22 pistol, the fence won't give you more than $30. But if you get a .44 Magnum or a nine millimeter, you can get $150.

Q. WHAT WOULD DETER YOU? A. A high-quality alarm system. Most burglars, if they see an alarm, they'll go to another house; why bother trying to bypass an alarm when there are so many homes without them? Dogs are noisy and threatening, but you can usually stop them by giving them a piece of meat or, if that doesn't work, shooting them -- although I don't usually go in with a gun. Neighborhood watch programs are another story. I try to stay away from neighborhoods like that.

Q. WERE YOU EVER BURGLARIZED? A. Once, in 1986. They stole a VCR and some jewelry. I felt mad -- the same way the people I robbed must have felt when they came back to an empty place. But I guess what goes around comes around.