Would you be too scared to buy a house where you know someone died?

[HelloHockeyFans]

Originally Posted by troutman

http://www.reca.ca/consumer_informat...properties.htm

Consumers may have other areas of concern that would cause them to avoid a property. Certain events may cause a property to be described as a “stigmatized property.” This term is sometimes applied to a property that has had some circumstance occur in or near it, but which does not specifically affect the appearance or function of the property itself.


Examples of these might include:

1. a pedophile is reported to live in the neighbourhood
2. a former resident was suspected of being an organized crime gang member
3. a death occurred in the property
4. the property was robbed or vandalised
5. there are reports that the property is haunted

Numbers 1 and 2 are definitely reasons I wouldn't buy a house.

1 - It's obvious.

2 - Tons of crap could arise because of this... mistargeted hits on you when rivals mistake you for being the mark and if the house were ever used for green... the mould and other damage to the property means more money out of your pocket to fix.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by HelloHockeyFans

Why does this matter?

As someone who does believe in spirits, I've done a bit of research on the subject. People who die quickly, accidentally and violently are more likely to haunt the place they died... as they don't realize their dead... however...

Exactly.

I guess it's hard for me to understand the reasoning when people are afraid because a "ghost" might haunt them at night, or show up in the reflection of a mirror in the washroom.

Use the incident as an excuse and get the guy to drop the price even more Syl... then snap it up. Great opportunity.

It's clear you don't believe in that type of thing anyway, so I'm not sure why you'd care how that makes a difference.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by FireFly

As someone who does believe in spirits, I've done a bit of research on the subject. People who die quickly, accidentally and violently are more likely to haunt the place they died... as they don't realize their dead... however...



It's clear you don't believe in that type of thing anyway, so I'm not sure why you'd care how that makes a difference.

There is not one shred of credible evidence that there are ghosts or spirits.

http://www.skepdic.com/ghosts.html

Still,

According to a 2005 Gallup poll, 32% believe in ghosts, down from 38% five years ago and up from 25% in 1990.

[Gozer]

It would bother me more if there had been a rape in the bedroom I'd be sleeping in, or child abuse in my theoretical kid's room. I'd never know about it though.


Drunk teenagers killing themselves out of stupidity is closer to natural selection than anything else.

[onetwo_threefour]

I'm going to post my story, and I want to hear whether people think the Seller should tell the buyer what happened.

So I sold a condo I owned in 2006 to this guy who moved in and lived there for a little under a year. In actual fact he didn't live there much at all because he was working in Africa most of the time. Now, they guy came home and decided he was going to sell this condo, and strangely enough, he used one of the realtors I get a lot of referrals for and he ended up using my firm for the sale of the property. I met with the guy and signed papers a couple of weeks before possession. (Everything seemed fine, but we actually had to rebook once because the guy was going to the hospital because he was having chest pains)

Then about four days before closing I get a call from the Realtor telling me this guy had committed suicide in the unit, and did something have to be said to the purchaser. The Realtor told me that this guy was quite depressed about his health (heart problems) and it was assumed he killed himself as a result. I wanted to look into things, and apparently the guy died in a massive pool of blood on the kitchen floor, but there was no suicide note and no weapon evideent. Because of the circumstances, there was an autopsy done, and it turns out that the guy was neither murdered, nor did he commit suicide. He had picked up some sort of nasty parasite in Africa (some kind of worm or something, I didn't get the complete deatails) which caused a massive internal hemmorhage, which led to this guy bleeding to death on the floor of his kitchen. Now this parasite was non-communicable at this point. The question being, ethically, should the Realtor have an oblgation to go into the details with a Purchaser, or even advise the Purchaser of the death?

[Sylvanfan]

Well the realtor who showed the place is a long time local. Told us the story because his daughter was at the party. By the sounds of it the person was just shot there. Still it's not like it was someone intentionally murdered and left there for days. Plus the house has more or less been redone two times over on the inside. To me it's an non-issue, than again they say don't buy a drug house because it'll always be known as a drug house.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by onetwo_threefour

I'm going to post my story, and I want to hear whether people think the Seller should tell the buyer what happened.

So I sold a condo I owned in 2006 to this guy who moved in and lived there for a little under a year. In actual fact he didn't live there much at all because he was working in Africa most of the time. Now, they guy came home and decided he was going to sell this condo, and strangely enough, he used one of the realtors I get a lot of referrals for and he ended up using my firm for the sale of the property. I met with the guy and signed papers a couple of weeks before possession. (Everything seemed fine, but we actually had to rebook once because the guy was going to the hospital because he was having chest pains)

Then about four days before closing I get a call from the Realtor telling me this guy had committed suicide in the unit, and did something have to be said to the purchaser. The Realtor told me that this guy was quite depressed about his health (heart problems) and it was assumed he killed himself as a result. I wanted to look into things, and apparently the guy died in a massive pool of blood on the kitchen floor, but there was no suicide note and no weapon evideent. Because of the circumstances, there was an autopsy done, and it turns out that the guy was neither murdered, nor did he commit suicide. He had picked up some sort of nasty parasite in Africa (some kind of worm or something, I didn't get the complete deatails) which caused a massive internal hemmorhage, which led to this guy bleeding to death on the floor of his kitchen. Now this parasite was non-communicable at this point. The question being, ethically, should the Realtor have an oblgation to go into the details with a Purchaser, or even advise the Purchaser of the death?

If the seller died of natural causes, I don't think that should have to be disclosed.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Sylvanfan

Well the realtor who showed the place is a long time local. Told us the story because his daughter was at the party. By the sounds of it the person was just shot there. Still it's not like it was someone intentionally murdered and left there for days. Plus the house has more or less been redone two times over on the inside. To me it's an non-issue, than again they say don't buy a drug house because it'll always be known as a drug house.

Is it a drug house?

A dead guy and a drug house? What the hell kind of community are you moving into here?

[Slava]

Originally Posted by fotze

In Beetlejuice they died outside of the house (off the old covered bridge and into the crick) and yet, still haunted it, so it clearly proves that the locale of death is not correlatable to the house being haunted.

Oh great....that is not only true, but it changes everything! I would've said that I could care less about someone dying in the house. But when you look at this irrefutable evidence that they hanuted the place and didn't even die in it I'm no longer sure. Would it matter if the house was an infill and someone had died on the original property? Maybe there is a paranormal case to be made for ever expanding urban sprawl here...although clearly not onto native burial grounds or things like that!

[CaptainCrunch]

If I die, I want to come back and haunt my neighnours wifes underwear drawer. That woman is hot.

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by FireFly

As someone who does believe in spirits, I've done a bit of research on the subject. People who die quickly, accidentally and violently are more likely to haunt the place they died... as they don't realize their dead... however...



It's clear you don't believe in that type of thing anyway, so I'm not sure why you'd care how that makes a difference.

I'd argue that those circumstances regarding death let it be known those that are still living the exact place and way in which they died for people's minds to creatively fabricate paranormal activity and scare themselves.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Locke

Is it a drug house?

A dead guy and a drug house? What the hell kind of community are you moving into here?

Welcome to Beautiful British Columbia.

[onetwo_threefour]

Hey troutman, thanks for the RECA link in your earlier post re: stigmatized properties. It sums up how I think about them pretty well, but I hadn't seen that before.

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by Ford Prefect

I think that's a bit of an urban legend. If there are ghosts, and I'm not saying there are, I know people who swear they have friendly ghosts from former owners who died of natural causes and were simply strongly attached to their homes.

As for ghosts, real or not, can someone cite a proven case of a ghost actually killing someone? I don't mean panicking someone into jumping off a cliff. I mean stabbing, shooting, beating someone to death. I've certainly never heard of such a case.

What about suicides? Is it true that they stay as ghosts and are afraid to leave because they have sinned?

And I don't think a ghost can physically harm someone. They're just a nuisance.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by onetwo_threefour

Hey troutman, thanks for the RECA link in your earlier post re: stigmatized properties. It sums up how I think about them pretty well, but I hadn't seen that before.

I thought realtors had a positive duty to disclose this kind of thing from what a few realtors have told me, but it appears it depends on the circumstances.

[onetwo_threefour]

Originally Posted by Slava

Oh great....that is not only true, but it changes everything! I would've said that I could care less about someone dying in the house. But when you look at this irrefutable evidence that they hanuted the place and didn't even die in it I'm no longer sure. Would it matter if the house was an infill and someone had died on the original property? Maybe there is a paranormal case to be made for ever expanding urban sprawl here...although clearly not onto native burial grounds or things like that!

Of course not then you end up with Poltergeist or Pet Sematery!!

[flylock shox]

I remember watching a forensics documentary in which they showed an investigation into a suicide that had happened about 9 months earlier. Because the body hadn't been discovered for such a long time it had decomposed significantly, and the bodily fluids from the decomposition had soaked into the carpet, been absorbed by the walls, and had stained all the way to the ceiling. They scraped the body off the floor no problem, but the floor, walls, and ceiling would all have to be replaced.

The lesson: before you buy, make sure they haven't just painted over the juices of the dead.

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by troutman

I thought realtors had a positive duty to disclose this kind of thing from what a few realtors have told me, but it appears it depends on the circumstances.

Could one argue that since such events can effect the value of the home for the buyer when they choose to re-sell the property that this would fall under fiduciary duties of the realtor?

[Resolute 14]

The only reason I can see why this would bother me is if it was a drug related murder, the guy who was killed was killed for hiding the drugs, the drugs were hidden in the walls, and the gang that killed him reallywanted those drugs back.

Otherwise, just make sure the walls are clean when I move in.

[HelloHockeyFans]

Originally Posted by FireFly

As someone who does believe in spirits, I've done a bit of research on the subject. People who die quickly, accidentally and violently are more likely to haunt the place they died... as they don't realize their dead... however...

Seriously? Are you serious?

Originally Posted by troutman

There is not one shred of credible evidence that there are ghosts or spirits.

http://www.skepdic.com/ghosts.html

Still,

According to a 2005 Gallup poll, 32% believe in ghosts, down from 38% five years ago and up from 25% in 1990.

EXACTLY. Boggles the mind.