What if you find out the house you bought
is haunted! Should You Remodel or Move,
or call in " The Real Ghost Hunters"?
Haunted Houses for sale happen
every day all the time. Would you dare buy
one!
Story By
Chamberlyn Cole
Buyers' feelings about houses, or
land or condo's or buildings with
haunted reputations are a little more
difficult to pin down. Although not
everyone believes in ghosts, buyers
should be made aware if the house
has a neighborhood, local or national
reputation for being haunted. Some
Haunted houses as Amityville, Lalaurie
Mansion, and The Myrtles Plantation
seem to be the most well known world
wide. But what about the local are
ones that neighbors talk of in hushed
tones. Is that the one for you?
Stigmatized-property laws vary greatly
by state, by the way, in part because
stigmas relate to strongly varying
perceptions, values and religious
beliefs. Texas property codes don't
address this type of issue. Other
states say psychological stigmas are
simply not material to a home transaction
and allow sellers to omit their disclosure
without liability. California laws,
for example, say sellers and agents
don't have to disclose a death --
even a murder -- that happened three
or more years before the sale.
But in the world today there are
many who would love to own or live
in a real haunted house.
What's A Stigmatized
Home?
Stigmatized property is a term used
in the real estate business which
describes possible detrimental features
of a property or home, all the result
of unfortunate occurrences. These
can include murder, suicide or even
AIDS, in addition to a belief that
a house may be haunted.
It's not easy to sell a house inhabited
by a ghost. Or a property that's been
the scene of a ghastly crime or suicide.
There are properties which are in
flawless physical condition but may
nevertheless present unusual marketing
issues. For instance, homes which
have been the site of murders, suicides,
or which are reportedly inhabited
by ghosts, or voodoo spells are known
as "stigmatized" properties.
This is a home with a condition which
is psychological in nature rather
than a matter of bricks and mortar.
Spain’s spiritual
home, a famous haunted house in the
southern province of Jaén,
was put for sale and attracted huge
interest from those desperate for
ready-made tenants - a cast of ghosts
whose faces appear on floors and walls.
Owner, María Gómez,
had discovered human faces in the
concrete floor 30 years earlier and
it had became so famous that queues
of visitors formed every weekend.
The Bélmez Faces (also called
The Faces of Bélmez) is considered
by some parapsychologists the best-documented
and "without doubt the most important
paranormal phenomenon [in the 20th]
century". Located at the Pereira
family home at Street Real 5, Bélmez
de la Moraleda, Jaén, Spain,
the Bélmez faces have been
responsible for bringing large numbers
of sightseers to Bélmez. Starting
in 1971, people have claimed to see
images of faces that continuously
and unexplainably form and disappear
on the floor of the Pereiras' home.
Wall face” appearance, purportedly
paranormal but probably made by human
hands, of the famous House of the
Faces in Spain. Cesar Tort, took the
photo in February 1992 with the permission
of the owner of the house: María
Gómez Cámara.
These faces, and many more which
have already disappeared, have been
appearing at irregular intervals in
the past thirty-five years and have
been frequently photographed by the
local newspapers and curious visitors.
Many Bélmez residents believe
that the faces were not made by human
hands, which has led some investigators
to conjecture that it is a thoughtographic
phenomenon unconsciously produced
by the owner of the house, María
Gómez Cámara. ("Thoughtography"
is considered a form of psychokinesis
among parapsychologists.)
On the other hand, skeptical researchers
point out that, as the faces of Bélmez
are fixed on whitewash of cement,
unlike other psychic claims a qualified
authority can offer a dictum on the
molecular changes that take place
in such mass of concrete; as well
as experts in conjuring. Skeptics
have performed extensive tests on
the faces and maintain they have demonstrated
that fakery has been involved.
Eventually a two-metre trench was
dug, revealing bones from a 13th-century
graveyard.
The subject of stigmatized houses
is complex. While some people may
want a house with a ghost, others
do not. The subject gets tangled even
further when one is asked whether
murders and suicides at a property
must be disclosed. Even though a particular
buyer may not care about any stigma
attached to the property, the stigma
may make it very difficult to resell
in the future. Therefore, while a
buyer may or may not believe in supernatural
phenomena, he/she may want to know
about a property's bloody past. However,
depending on the jurisdiction of the
house, the seller may not be required
to disclose the full facts.
In December 1975, George and Kathleen
Lutz and their children moved into
112 Ocean Avenue, a Dutch Colonial
house in Amityville, a suburban neighborhood
located on the south shore of Long
Island, New York. Thirteen months
before the Lutzes moved in, Ronald
DeFeo, Jr. had shot dead six members
of his family at the house. After
28 days the Lutzes left the house,
claiming to have been terrorized by
paranormal phenomena while living
there.
The Amityville Horror
is a best-selling book by the author
Jay Anson which was published in September
1977. The book has also formed the
basis of a series of films made between
1979 and 2005. The story is allegedly
based on real life events, but has
caused controversy over the reliability
of many of its claims.
The rules on this matter vary by
state -- some say a given condition
must be disclosed, others say "no,"
some say disclosure is not necessary
after so many years, and some states
say nothing one way or the other.
For specifics, please speak with a
broker or real estate attorney in
your community. Realty Agents back
the practice of disclosure, as they
do not want fingers pointed at them
in the event a major issue is discovered
after closing and a lawsuit entails.
This can lead to bad press about the
agents and brokers. The National Association
of Realtors (NAR) would like to see
some form of disclosure mandated in
every state. According to the NAR,
one of the largest areas of controversy
in the process of buying and selling
a home is the failure to disclose
the defects in the property.
Real-estate professionals call homes
tainted by murder, sex scandals or
messy divorce "stigmatized properties."
While they make up a sliver of the
market, they have been the subject
of academic research, provided fodder
for lawsuits and posed a challenge
for brokers. State real-estate agent
and appraisal groups regularly include
the subject in seminars, and the National
Association of Realtors® publishes
a "Field Guide to Dealing with
Stigmatized Property," offering
insights on everything from how to
market and sell stigmatized homes
to dealing with buyer reluctance to
own them. One scandal-dampening suggestion
from the guide's "tool kit":
Enhance the home's facade by painting
it or replanting shrubs and flowers.
New Orleans Famous
Most Haunted House ghost tour attraction,
The Lalaurie Mansion!
There are different degrees of stigma,
of course. Appraisers and brokers
say murder -- in particular, multiple
homicides and cult killings -- is
by far the toughest kind of notoriety
to minimize. Suicides and hauntings
come next, followed by illicit sex
and celebrity infidelities. When bold-face
names aren't involved, hanky-panky
appears to have little impact. "If
real-estate values were hurt for every
house where the owners were unfaithful,
we'd have a fire sale out here,"
says Steven Gaines of East Hampton,
N.Y., author of 1999's "Philistines
at the Hedgerow: Passion and Property
in the Hamptons."
The most haunted building
in the city of New Orleans, story
told by Matthew Yaddoshi of Haunted
History Tours, New Orleans, August
2005. After you hear the above haunted
tale of the Lalaurie Mansion. Think
about it. would you buy it if it was
for sale? And what would your motives
be?
James A. Willis, a Columbus-based
paranormal investigator, sees it all
the time. He's the founder and director
of the Ghosts of Ohio Inc., a nonprofit
organization that researches alleged
hauntings by using the latest ghost-busting
technology. More than 425 Ohio homeowners
have reported unearthly appearances
and other creepy stuff to his Web
site, http://www.ghostsofohio.org,
since Willis' organization was established
in 1998.
He estimates that half of the reports
are probably bogus. But the other
half keep Willis and his team of volunteer
investigators busy with their infrared
cameras and thermometers, electromagnetic
field testers and other scientific
equipment.
"One of the most common fears
our clients have is that the data
we collect on their homes will be
made public ? which it never is. They
absolutely don't want their property
listed as stigmatized," Willis
said.
The Myrtles Plantation
has a haunted value to paranormal
investigators world wide. Would you
buy it if it was for sale?
Read
more here " Real Haunted Houses
For Sale" in the News:
But not all cursed houses go up in
value. Serial killer Fred West’s
Cromwell Street home in Gloucester
was bulldozed two years after it was
discovered he’d buried victims
including members of his own family
under the foundations.
This House is "reportedly
haunted." "Instead of a
Hot Tub, we have a real live ghost"!
In New York, some ghostly precedent
was set in the small town of Nyack,
where a buyer placed earnest money
on a mansion he later found to be
haunted -- at least in the experience
of the former owner. She had advertised
it thusly to promote her bed-and-breakfast
operation there, even describing various
resident ghosts in detail, in local
and national media reports. Because
of the public statements, New York's
Supreme Court ruled the buyer wasn't
given all the facts during disclosure
and ordered the owner to return the
deposit and pay a small amount in
damages.
The National Association of Realtors
says, in effect, "when in doubt,
disclose." (Check out the association's
"Field Guide to Dealing with
Stigmatized Property" at www.realtor.org
for much more information and links.)
In your case, it sounds as if you
disclosed all the material facts.
A excerpt from an Article in the
Registar Guard of Eugene, Oregan.
The house-for-sale ad in Saturday's
paper starts out like many others
- bedrooms, bathrooms, formal dining
room - but then it lists a unique
feature: resident ghost.
"We haven't seen anything, we
mainly hear noises," said owner
Charlotte Brady, who lived in the
two-story, 80-year-old house on Fillmore
Street for about 30 years until moving
to a modern home in southeast Eugene
a couple of months ago. "We often
hear a ball bouncing - it sounds like
a hard rubber ball - and it starts
at the top of the stairs and seems
to hit every step on the way down."
Other typically ghostly things happened
occasionally, such as lights turning
on or off and finding doors or windows
opened or closed, but those things
might be explained away by the comings
and goings of a half-dozen people
living in a household, she said.
Real estate broker Ruby Brockett
said she's never heard of a house
ghost in all her many years of selling
homes in Lane County, "but in
the East it's very common."
"Usually it's a person who wasn't
ready to go or who has an attachment
to the place they lived," Brockett
said. "There's a whole 'nother
dimension out there we haven't run
into yet."
The idea of having a house ghost
never really bothered Brady, until
the knocking episode.
"I was home alone, sitting on
the floor of my daughters' room one
day when they were much younger, and
all of a sudden something started
knocking really loudly on the wall
right next to me," Brady said.
"It made me madder than anything
- I didn't have issues with it being
here until I thought it might be trying
to scare the kids."
In general, the value of a house
that has been the site of a suicide
doesn't take as much of a hit as the
value of a house that has been the
site of a homicide, said appraiser
Randy Bell, who specializes in stigmatized
properties. But if the stigmatized
house is in a rural or suburban area,
it will probably experience more of
an impact than an urban home.
Do you dare disclose if there is
murder or mayhem at your listing?
What are the professional and logistical
challenges if there is a well publicized
ghost on your next property? Don't
despair, help is here! This page offers
some creative marketing tools and
advice for selling properties with
an unsavory past.
WARNING
- if you received email that says its from "hauntedamericatours.com",
and has attachments, do not open them. They are not from Haunted
AmericaTours.com. hauntedamericatours.com never emails attachments
to anyone.
YOU SHOULD NEVER - EVER - OPEN EMAIL ATTACHMENTS!
Haunted America Tours does not send spam,
and will not sell your email address to anyone. Haunted America
Tours does not support or endorse any myspace.com pages including
spoof myspace pages claiming to be Haunted America Tours. If you
receive a friends request or any other contact regarding Haunted
America Tours on Myspace please disregard as we DO NOT maintain
any presence on myspace or any other Internet blogging sites.
