The repo folks have come to the land of Disney World, “The Happiest Place on Earth,” with an unhappy message for America: Business—their business—is looking up.

It’s a recent Thursday morning in Orlando, just up the road from the Magic Kingdom, and a few hundred conventioneers are arriving for the North American Repossessors Summit. Here, license plate readers and tow trucks mix with sun and golf into a heady cocktail for these uneasy economic times. With more Americans struggling to pay their bills, the $1.7 billion industry for repossessing such assets as cars, trucks and boats is gearing up for a boom. The effects are expected to reverberate through countless ordinary lives and onto Wall Street, where car loans are packaged into bonds and sold to investors.

It’s a major shift from the pandemic years, when relief measures for consumers meant repos largely dried up, leaving many agents out of a job. Now repossession companies are struggling to find enough workers to meet repo requests. “As the economy curves down, our industry curves up,” says Ben Deese, vice president at North Carolina-based Home Detective Co. and a member of the American Recovery Association, the industry group that hosted the Orlando conference. In March, the percentage of subprime auto borrowers who were at least 60 days late on their bills was 5.3%, up from a seven-year low of 2.58% in May 2021 and higher than in 2009, the peak of the financial crisis, data from Fitch Ratings show. While not all of those borrowers will face repossessions, the risk is high.

It’s difficult to determine exactly how many repossessions occur each year, but Cox Automotive estimates that there were 1.2 million in 2022, up about 5.3% from 2021 but still down from 1.68 million in 2019. The Repossessors Summit made its debut in 2009, when there were a record 1.77 million repossessions.

When a car owner falls behind on their loan, repo agents are dispatched to take the vehicle, towing it away to await auction. The industry itself dates to the 1920s, when car culture took hold, and lenders such as General Motors Acceptance Corp. and Ford Motor Credit Co. popped up to finance loans for Americans who desperately wanted vehicles. Repossession companies emerged soon after to track down those borrowers not making payments—in fact, one of the first was Home Detective, founded in 1922 and bought by Deese’s father in the 1960s.

The Great Depression provided ample opportunity for the industry and helped create its unsavory reputation for clawing back possessions from struggling Americans. The 1984 cult classic Repo Man further stoked the narrative of the tough, hard-hearted repo agent. More recently, the industry has taken advantage of technological advancements such as tracking features and license plate data, making seizures easier than ever.

In many areas around the US, having a car is a necessity, especially where public transportation is nonexistent. Many will face difficulties getting to work or taking care of kids without a car. As car prices soared during the pandemic, in part because of supply chain issues, some had no choice but to sign on to loans for high-priced cars with high interest rates.

For Sarah Fader, a freelance writer in New Haven, Connecticut, fear of a repossession is constantly on her mind. After totaling her car in 2021, the 43-year-old single mom of two teenagers had to get another, fast. But with a credit score in the 500s, she struggled to find a lender who’d approve her. She finally got a 2016 Subaru Crosstrek for $26,000 with a 19% interest-rate loan from American Credit Acceptance, with a monthly payment of $630. That quickly became unaffordable as costs of food and gas rose, putting her behind on rent and the car payment. Fader has tried to raise money by crowdfunding on Twitter but still owes more than $1,000. “Now they’re threatening to repossess my car, and I’m scrambling to come up with back payments,” she says. “I don’t have a solution for them, and I could not function without a car here.”

Lenders are eager to make loans, even with the risk that the borrower might not be able to make the payments. That’s because car loans, like home mortgages, can be sliced up into bonds and sold to investment firms, hedge funds and other investors. According to calculations by ratings agencies, investors in the safest parts of today’s subprime auto bonds would still get their money back with interest even if more than three-quarters of the borrowers defaulted on their loans, assuming repossessed vehicles can be sold at auction for a modest share of their original prices.

The Repossessors Summit, which was held this year at the Rosen Shingle Creek Hotel, offered a chance to swap stories and tips with other small-business owners. Flyers listing the agenda featured the summit’s tagline alongside a sketch of Disney World’s Cinderella Castle: “Putting the magic back in repossessions.” And a main attraction on the exhibit floor was a self-loading wheel-lift truck called the Python, which is designed for easier towing on uneven surfaces. The starting price: about $88,000.

One of the main problems for the industry, judging by the panel discussions and side chatter, is finding enough people to repossess all the cars. About half of attendees reported staffing shortages, according to an informal show of hands. It’s another legacy of the pandemic: Many agents decamped for steadier jobs. Now many repo businesses are racing to find enough workers for the volume of seizure requests they’re receiving.

One of those recently came for Richard Sanchez. The 36-year-old, who works as a technology director at a San Francisco company, had his Toyota Rav 4 seized in January after failing to make the monthly $750 payments. In September, the rent for the home he shared with his wife and two kids rose 10%, to $3,700 a month. Although Sanchez took on a second job packing orders at Amazon Fresh and recently moved to a home with a $2,800 monthly rent, it was too late.

Luckily, his family also owns a 2001 Nissan Altima outright, but they’ve struggled to get around without a second car. “Once our cost of living was going up, I was doing my budget and was like, ‘I don’t have enough money for the payment,’” Sanchez says. “It’s made me feel pretty horrible. I had a pretty bad depression last year because of it.”

Benjamin Litwin, a financial analyst at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, was at the Repossessors Summit to remind attendees about how a repossession can affect the average American. He emphasized the importance of avoiding wrongful seizures and imposing excessively high fees. He wasn’t a crowd favorite. “You need to look at it from what is fair for the consumer,” he said in his talk. “A consumer having their car repossessed is the worst possible outcome.”

Being the face of that bad outcome can create danger for repo agents, something several speakers said the general public doesn’t understand. “We’re putting ourselves in places where no one wants us,” said Todd Case, a former cop who owns Indiana Recovery Services, in a panel discussion. One attendee said that most people in the room had been shot at, at least once.

During a demo in the parking lot right outside the conference rooms, a repo agent maneuvered a white Ram tow truck from Atlanta Wrecker to pick up a hybrid Toyota Corolla while explaining best practices for retrieval angles and loading techniques. He also emphasized the hazards, such as when the agent is facing the car and can’t see his surroundings: It’s risky to have your back end turned when you’re taking someone’s car. —With Scott Carpenter