The phone call came early.

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news," said a neighbor of Chris and Virginia Shawver at 5 a.m. on Tuesday.

The Athol couple confirmed his news with their own groggy eyes: Someone had stolen the rims and tires off the Toyota Land Cruiser they had been trying to sell off their front lawn.

"You can see where they had rolled it up the hill to get them off," said Virginia, 41. "It just makes you sick. These were $1,300 to $1,500 worth of mud tires and rims. It's not like they were just stock."

The blue-gray vehicle they've owned for four years was left haphazardly propped up on small wood blocks, which Virginia said indicated the thieves came prepared.

The couple has been trying to sell their used vehicle off and on for awhile, she said, to bring in a extra cash for raising their two children, ages 5 and 9, and with finishing their house, which still needs exterior work and a deck.

"We just didn't need this," Virginia said. "We're going to be OK, but we would much rather spend our money on something else right now."

The car wasn't insured because they don't drive it often, she added.

A sheriff's deputy told the family he had driven by at midnight and the whole car had been intact, she said, so the theft occurred sometime in the following five hours.

Usually the Shawvers brought the car in for the night, she added, but they left it out for the Fourth of July weekend hoping to attract interest from the increased traffic.

"We got a call about it this morning, and we had to say, 'Well, there are no rims or tires,'" Virginia said.

Neighbors have already offered to loan their tires and rims so the Shawvers can drive the vehicle back in their garage.

The family will replace the equipment as soon as they can, Virginia said.

Chris, 44, does maintenance work for radio towers. Virginia is an artist and stay at home mom.

Virginia hopes others are cautious after what happened to them, and that they keep their vehicles inside.

"It just shows the sad state the country is in when people are stealing tires and rims off a car," she said.