Police are hunting “well organised” teams of cross-county burglars who target homes for raids on particular days.

The men, believed to be travellers or of eastern European origin, use high-performance cars like BMWs and Audis to get in and out of their target area, and often raid several homes for cash and jewellery in one visit.

Kingston detectives said the groups were being tracked by police forces in Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire, as well as the Metropolitan police.

They warned residents of Kingston, Sutton and Croydon to be vigilant, and said so far the groups appear to have operated along the A3 corridor, particularly in New Malden.

DCI Claire Moxon, head of Kingston CID, told the Surrey Comet: “We seem to have teams of three or four coming in in high-powered vehicles.

"They will come in for just one day. It could be any day.

“We can link them by location, suspects and their method. Their age ranges from late teens into the 30s.

“They will try and hide their faces by wearing scarves, hats and hooded tops.

“They will operate when it is dark, from about 5pm to 8pm.

“One of the males will act as lookout, and then the others will establish whether there is anybody in.

“They will just force through the back door. They’re not very delicate in that way.

“They are just looking for cash and jewellery – they do not bother with iPads and phones. They are quite well organised, but basic burglars.

“At the minute it is more New Malden, but actually it is anywhere off that immediate A3 area.

“We need people to lock their doors, we need people to put lights on so it looks like someone is in.

“We want the public to be quite vigilant. We want them, if they see anything suspicious, to call 999 because we need to get there pretty quickly, because we're not getting forensic opportunities.”

The men use cleaning products to remove any forensic trace, she said.

DI Simon Day added: “If someone strange knocks on your door and do not really have a real purpose, we want a phone call.

“We never get enough calls like that. Be insistent that you thought this was really strange.

“That could be an attempted burglary and we need to get there.”

DCI Moxon said no arrests have yet been made.