These Murder Houses Will Leave You Haunted: Literally.

Have you ever considered what happens to the energy of a place after a terrible crime occurs? What becomes of a murder house once the event takes place? Can people live there afterward, and if so, are there any leftover traces of the terror that took place? Here are some stories from people who have lived in murder houses. These tales offer a glimpse into the grisly reality of what can linger long after a crime has been committed.

1) Flats Murder

I had never been the biggest fan of my birthday. It always made me feel silly, all the fanfare and attention, but when Joey told me he was throwing a party for me at the Matsqui Flats house I couldn’t say no. The place was everything a college kid could have dreamed of. The converted garage was furnished with a ping pong table, a fully stocked beer fridge, and a bunch of cozy couches perfect for crashing on late at night after the festivities. The walls were covered in murals and the closet was jam-packed with every board game I’d ever heard of. I may not have loved birthdays, but I loved my friends, and I loved a party at the Matsqui Flats' house.

I applied another coat of mascara and took a look down at my watch. If I left now, I’d be early, but Joey would be expecting that. My mother always told me that if I was early, I was on time, and if I was on time, I was late. I grabbed my keys and headed out the door into the dark winter night.

As I walked across the quad, I felt my body going tense. Things had been happening lately, bad things to young girls. We’d been advised during an uncharacteristically somber floor meeting to move in pairs and stay vigilant, lest we end up like Amber and Kelly.

The two were sorority sisters who’d gone missing during a night out. The next day Kelly stumbled into the police station, so badly bruised and beaten she was hardly recognizable. She told a harrowing tale of escaping the clutches of a sadistic psychopath who had killed her friend and almost Kelly too. I tried to stay away from crime news, never feeling the desire to learn the gory details, but the case was being covered so heavily in my little college town that it was inescapable. It was the perfect headline, the brutal slaying of a beautiful sorority sister and the brave survival of her heroic friend. The press ate it up.

What’s more, the man had yet to be caught. Despite Kelly’s help and the police’s best efforts, it seemed that he had disappeared into thin air. Until he decided to start toying with them again. Though it couldn’t be proven that it was him, it was the only thing that made sense. Who else would remove Amber’s headstone in some sort of twisted joke while the soil she was buried beneath was still loose? Who else would call into the local radio station and describe in detail the look on her face in her last moments? The man was a sicko, and he was on the loose in our little college town. I shivered at the thought and quickened my pace to the car, trying to put the horrible events of the past week out of my mind. Finally, I reached my car, ducked in, locked the doors, and relaxed with a sigh. No more thoughts of Amber or Kelly or serial killers, I decided. It was my birthday after all.

I turned up the ABBA song on the radio and pulled out of the parking lot onto the main road, singing along as I did. The drive to Joey’s place wasn’t a short one but it was along a usually empty stretch of road surrounded by farmland. Frankly, it was easy to speed. As I sped along the road doing at least ten over the limit, I watched as the space between the houses grew further and further apart and the streetlights became more infrequent. Ditches lined the street and I veered toward the middle of the road, fearing the idea of sliding into one. As I approach the old schoolhouse, my sign to take a right, Don’t Fear the Reaper begins to play on the radio. I look down to adjust the volume and when I look up, what I see makes me slam on my brakes and veer the steering wheel sharply left.

There, barefoot and blonde, stood a woman of about my age on the side of the road. In my haste and distracted state, I had nearly plowed her down. Catching my breath, I look out the passenger side window or the girl, my body pumping with adrenaline. What in the world had she been doing out here in the middle of the night without shoes on? But when I looked in the spot she had been standing, by the right-side ditch in front of the old schoolhouse, she was gone. I searched feverishly for where she might have gone, craning my neck in every direction. Though it was dark the land was flat and empty, it seemed impossible that she simply disappeared, and it was no doubt dangerous to be running around late at night with a killer on the loose.

I took a deep breath and tried to shake it off. I started back along my route and in a few minutes arrived at Joey’s house. I let myself in without knocking, my heart still thumping in my chest. Joey was attempting to hang streamers and when I barreled through the door, he almost lost his balance atop the chair he stood.

“Jesus, you scared me!” I grabbed a beer from the fridge and cracked it open, throwing myself into one of the plush couches. “Oh, I mean, happy birthday,” he said.

“I’ll tell you something scary,” I replied, and then recounted to him the tale of the vanishing barefoot woman in the road. He listened intently, his mouth a straight line. When I finish the story, he furrowed his brow.

“You know, that’s not far from where… it happened.”

My blood went cold. He didn’t have to specify what he meant, I knew, we all knew. Somewhere not too far from that schoolhouse, our classmate had been murdered and another had to fight for her life.

Just then Janet and Mari burs through the door. They greeted me with a flurry of hugs and well wishes, but I could see an odd look in their eyes. They grabbed themselves beers and silence fell across the room. I cleared my throat and spoke.

“Are you guys, okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

They exchanged looks and shuffled their feet uncomfortably.

“Promise you won’t think we’re crazy if we told you what we saw?” Mari was usually level-headed, but now she sounded frightened. I felt my pulse quicken and looked at Janet.

“I can’t speak for Mari, but I know what I saw,” she said, taking a long drink of her beer. I could hear my heart thumping in my ears.

“One second she was there, just standing by the side of the road in front of the old schoolhouse. The next second… it was like she disappeared into thin air.”

“Who?” I asked, my heart now a quick percussion and my skin tingling with the prick of sweat. I already knew the answer.

“The woman,” Mari replied “the barefoot one with blonde hair. What the hell was she doing out there in the middle of the night?”

I think about that night a lot, the night of my birthday in Matsqui Flats at Joey’s old house, but I couldn’t tell you what happened after that. The realization of what we’d seen weighed heavy on us that night and ever since we’ve all had a certain caution when it comes to the paranormal. I never found out exactly where Amber had died, though we know it’s near that old schoolhouse, but if I had to guess I’d say it was the ditch on the right side of the road where she finally met her end. One fact did come to light that nearly knocked the wind out of me the first time I read it in the paper. It was a tiny blurb, perhaps unimportant to anyone but myself in my friends, but to me, it was all the confirmation I needed to know what we saw on that long stretch of empty road.

The night Amber’s body was found, she was barefoot.

2) Dolly Dearest

Every neighborhood has that one house. The creepy one, shrouded in mystery, with a dark past and a looming presence. The type of place dumb kids like to try and sneak into on a dare. In my neighborhood, it was the Monroe house, and it was right across the street. What’s more, I was the dumb kid who tried to sneak in.

Before I was born the Monroe family lived there. They seemed like any other on the block and cared for their home with pride. The couple had a young son and two Dobermans. They lived a normal suburban existence for most of their lives. That’s why it was such a shock to all the neighbors when Mrs. Monroe came home to find Mr. Monroe swinging from an attic rafter. People claim he even hung the dogs too, and while no one but the police knows for sure, my grandma said she never saw those Dobermans again after that day.

The horror didn’t stop there, unfortunately. When I was fifteen, living with my mother and sister in my grandmother’s house right across the street from the Monroe mansion, the son of the family murdered his only surviving parent. He went out back to the shed and grabbed a hammer, then snuck up behind her while she read the morning paper and smashed it into her head over a dozen times. Then he dug a hole in the backyard and buried her. That’s where she stayed for almost a year, as the local news ran missing person reports on her weekly. They said when they finally dragged the murderous son out in handcuffs, he was wearing his mother’s old nightie and panties, but that could just be a rumor invented by some bored housewives.

In any case, the house earned a reputation. Despite the comically low asking price, it couldn’t sell and was eventually boarded up and condemned. It became a challenge for the local teens to break in and see how long they could last before they got too spooked to stay. It was silly, I know, but that’s what kids do, and one muggy summer evening we decided to test our nerves by breaking into the Monroe Mansion ourselves.

Four of us, myself included, had spent the evening biking around the cul-de-sac. When evening slipped into night, we dropped our bikes on my front lawn and my grandma brought out glasses of her famous lemonade. We sipped them gratefully as we stared up at the house. As it grew darker there appeared to be a dim light flickering in the attic window. We watched, not sure if our eyes were betraying us, as the light grew brighter. We exchanged glances and without a second thought, my friend Carlos jumped to his feet.

“It’s a sign gang,” he said, smiling “tonight is the night.” Carlos had been begging us all summer to sneak into the house, but we’d always come up with an excuse. The twins exchanged a nervous glance. They had strict parents who instilled in them the fear of everything from men in vans to bumblebees. Their matching sets of blue eyes were filled with worry, but they both had a crush on Carlos and didn’t want to seem chicken, so they stood to join him nervously. I sighed and agreed as well, and we made our way across the street.

The boards on the cellar door had been ripped away by kids who came before us. We squabbled for a moment about who would go first, with Carlos finally volunteering to lead. With only the beam of a single flashlight to illuminate the way, we pushed open the door, its rusted hinges screaming in protest, and entered the dusty old home. We were immediately hit by the rancid smell of something old and rotten. The twins covered their pert noses with disgust as we scrambled for the stairs, gagging.

“What the hell is that?” I asked, my eyes watering from the putrid stink.

“Probably some cat,” Carlos responded, “crawled in here and died, or something.”

The smell dissipated as we climbed upstairs, but the dirty old house was ominous, to say the least. Something just felt wrong about the place, and I could tell my friends sensed it too. Just then, my foot hit something in the dark. I reached down blindly and wrapped my hand around it, raising it to my face to realize it was a tiny porcelain doll. I slipped it into my pocket and caught up to my friends who were gingerly examining what must have once been the living room.

Suddenly Carlos swung around, blinding us with the flashlight, and screamed “BOO!” The twins shrieked and then laughed, the sound echoing throughout the empty structure. I didn’t want to be here anymore, I suddenly realized, it felt like we were being watched and my friend’s flippant attitude was making me nervous. I opened my mouth to speak when suddenly one of the twins let out a blood-curdling scream. I thought for a moment that she too was joking, but then I saw her tear through the dark toward the front door, her sister close behind. I didn’t hesitate to follow them, and Carlos was on my heels. When we reached the still-boarded front door I threw the entire weight of my body against it, splintering the old wood. I pushed it open, my hands wrapping around a splinter-filled slice of wood that tore clean off as I ran, panting across the street.

When we made it back to my front door the twins were both teary-eyed and shaking. The one who first ran told me she thought she heard the sound of a woman moaning then felt something grab her leg. I was skeptical, assuring myself it was only their paranoia taking over, but we vowed not to go back either way. The twins left and Carlos and I were alone on my front porch. That’s when I showed him the items I’d taken from the house. When he saw them, his face lit up with a devilish grin.

“That’s perfect for the seance,” he said, licking his lips. I rolled my eyes but could think of anything better to do than to humor him, so we made our way into the garage where he lay down the items and began to prepare for the ritual. He forced me to hold hands and chant, chiding me when I laughed, but unsurprisingly nothing happened. He left a few hours later, disappointed, and I hid the doll and wood chip in the corner of the garage, covered in a tarp, so my grandma wouldn’t see it. If she had known we went hunting for ghosts in the Old Monroe house and tried to summon evil spirits in her old garage, there’d be hell to pay. What happened next, however, I cannot explain.

The following day after school I was greeted by my mother standing at the door, her arms folded.

“Why did you leave all those tools lying around the garage,” she asked indignantly.

“I didn’t,” I responded, “I haven’t even touched them.” She asked me who else could have made the mess, but I didn’t have an answer. She sent me over to clean it up either way, and I begrudgingly obliged.

When I opened the door to the garage the tools were scattered around the room. In the center of the mess, sat the doll. I silently cursed my sister for reminding me of that creepy old thing and making a mess I was now forced to clean. It had to have been her, I was sure of it, yet she denied it vehemently. I didn’t believe her. That is until it happened again.

I was home alone, sick with the flu, and staying out of school. I went into the garage in search of ibuprofen and when I opened the door the mess had returned, and once again the doll sat in the middle of the room, its black soulless eyes fixed on me. I had seen the state of the garage this morning after my family had left and it was perfectly clean. I couldn’t believe what I was looking at and the sight made my toes curl. I quickly cleaned up the mess, shoving the doll in a tackle box and closing it tight, piling it under one of the overflowing shelves where it stayed for many, many years.

We eventually moved out of my grandma’s house and away from the Monroe mansion. Slowly, the memory of that night and the scary little porcelain doll faded away. Until yesterday.

My grandma recently passed away and my mother was in charge of dealing with her things. She stopped by with a cardboard box and told me she had a gift for me, something I left at her house that I might want. The second she pulled it from the box the same sickening fear I felt that night crept over me. It was the doll, its empty eyes and smooth porcelain face as eerie as ever.

“Where did you find that,” I asked, and my mother looked down and began to stroke its hair. I had locked that thing away and hoped I’d never had to think of it again. But here it was, having found its way back to me. My mother sighed.

“It was right next to her,” she said, her voice soft “in grandmas’ bed… when she passed away.”

3) Victims of Villisca

It wasn’t your typical family trip. While some parents took their kids on cruises or to Disney World, my parents decided on Villisca, Iowa. Why may you ask? To visit the site of the Villisca ax murders.

The tour began in the town museum just outside the graveyard where the victims were buried. Our group of four, consisting of myself, my mother, her boyfriend Jeff, and my little sister Abigail, followed the khaki-clad tour guide through the modest building and through the old boneyard where the eight victims had been laid to rest. He stood in front of a tiny grave that read “Paul.”

“Everyone in the house that night met their fate at the end of an ax,” he explained. “Two adults and six children were brutally slain as they slept.” He went on to talk about the family, naming them off and recounting their lives before their untimely death. My mother hung on every word, having always been fascinated with ghost stories, while my sister trailed behind picking at her cuticles nervously. I took after my mother when it came to her interest in the macabre, and Jeff would do anything to indulge her, but Abi was easily frightened and didn’t love the idea of visiting a murder house on vacation.

As we followed the tour guide, now chatting with Jeff about the history of the house and its architect, through the front door and past the threshold of the home, I felt a chill go through me. A heavy sadness seemed to blanket the place, a vacuum of energy swirling through each room. We stopped in the living room, and I tuned back into what our guide was saying, unable to shake the feeling of emptiness.

“It is believed,” the tour guide explained “that the murderer broke in while the family wasn’t home. When the parents returned with their two children and the daughter’s two friends, the assailant hid in the attic and waited for them to fall asleep. In the dead of night, he crept from his hiding place and used an ax to end all of their lives. Unfortunately, no one was ever arrested for the crime.”

It was then that I noticed a shadowy figure of a woman standing in the doorway behind our guide. I blinked and she was gone, leaving nothing behind but the empty kitchen. I looked at my family to see if they had noticed her too, but they seemed unphased. It was just the spooky story getting to my head, I thought. I tried to shake it off.

When the tour was over the guide offered to let us look around the house alone. He left, and quietly we began to fan out. Jeff went to the backyard while my mother wandered off toward the kitchen, my sister grabbed my arm, and we made our way upstairs toward the children’s room.

“Abi, I think I saw something-” I began, but she cut me off.

“Don’t start Georgia, I’m already scared enough as it is. I don’t know why we couldn’t have gone to Cabo or something like a normal family.” I rolled my eyes and we continued through the rooms, slowly pacing the perimeter, learning to exist in the haze of sorrow that permeated our bones. Then, we heard footsteps above our heads.

There should have been no one else in the house but us, and we knew that. Upon hearing the noise Abi immediately dropped my arm with a squeal and bolted down the stairs toward the back door. I listened as the footsteps grew louder, then fainter again, then disappeared altogether. Every hair on my body stood on end.

“I don’t hear anything, honey,” I heard Jeff say from the floor below.

“Someone was up there, I swear,” Abigail pleaded, “ask Georgia, she heard it too.”

“How about we all go up there and check it out together,” my mother offered in a soothing voice. Abi obliged and they joined me on the second floor. Then, one by one we climbed the ladder to the attic where in the year 1912 a murderer once hid, waiting to slay their prey.

The attic was small, and the ceilings were low. We crammed in and stood in silence as we inhaled the scent of old wood. How strange it was, I thought, to be here. So many years later, remembering the ones who lost their life. It was a somber moment for all of us. Then we heard another sound.

It was faint at first, like the rustling of a breeze. Then it became more distinct. It was the whisper of a child’s voice, high and tinkling like a piano melody. My mother gasped and clamped her hands over her mouth and Jeff turned sheet white. Without hesitation, Abigail practically leaped from the attic and tore down the stairs, unable to stand another second there. We listened for a moment, then silence fell again.

“You heard that too, right?” I had to be sure I was sane. My mother shook her head in disbelief.

“I don’t know what I heard,” said Jeff. When we could no longer stand to stay in the cramped space, we retreated down the ladder and headed off to find Abi. Something made me pause, however, in the doorway of the children’s room once more. I felt an uncontrollable urge to enter, so I did and sat down in the center of the floor.

The room was dressed in furniture meant to make the house look like it had back in the day. Two beds lay against the wall and a basket of children’s toys sat at their feet. I picked up a pink ball from the basket and began to toss it up in the air. My mother sat beside me silently while Jeff lingered in the doorway.

“What’s your name?” The question surprised me, though I had asked it. I was never as confident in the existence of ghosts as my mother was, despite my interest in them, but I felt pulled to communicate with whatever energy still lingered here. I was no longer afraid of the old house, I thought. There was nothing here that wanted to hurt me. Then, I heard a whisper in my ear.

“Paul’” it said, as clear as if the little boy had been right beside me. I took a shaking breath and smiled, tears pinching my eyes.

“Hi Paul,” I replied. My mother looked on in awe. I handed her the pink ball. “Play with him, Ma. I think he needs a friend.”

My mother took a deep breath and rolled the ball across the room. It hit the wall and came to a stop. Nothing. She looked at me quizzically. It’s pink, I realized. It wasn’t Paul’s. The sweet little boy didn’t want to play with his sister’s toy. Turning back to the basket I grabbed the matching blue ball. I handed it to my mom, silently urging her to try again.

She rolled the ball toward the opposite wall and this time something miraculously happened. The ball stopped, then changed courses, rolling back toward us. I laughed aloud and covered my mouth. I could hardly believe what was happening. She did it again, and again the ball rolled back. Paul was playing with us, a game of ball from beyond the grave. We stayed there for a few moments, passing the ball back and forth, unable to believe what we were seeing. Finally, Paul got bored, as children do. I felt him leave the room and the ball hit the far wall with a thud. We couldn’t move. We couldn’t breathe.

Jeff tried to examine the floors to see if they were at an angle. He even jumped up and down trying to move the ball to no avail. He wanted a rational explanation for what we had just experienced, and Abi didn’t even want to hear about it as we joined her outside and tried to breathlessly explain, but my mother and I both know what happened that day.

A terrible tragedy occurred in that house. The murder of a family, of children, of Paul. Bad things shouldn’t happen to good people and lives should not be taken so uselessly. I still carry a sadness inside me since that visit to the Villisca House, but I find solace in the thought that Paul finally got to play ball once more; and now, I unquestioningly believe in ghosts.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. If you enjoyed these stories, please consider checking out my books on Amazon for more true tales of creepiness. Thank you again, and happy reading! Stories included in this article are ©Eve S Evans and may not be used without written consent from the author.

Eve Evans is a horror writer who specializes in ghost stories based on true events. She has also written some novellas and released her first full-length thriller novel, Beneath The Water, in June 2022. Later in 2022 she also released two more full-length thrillers, The Haunting of Lila Lamm and Frost Falls. She is also working on some other new thriller releases for 2023, including a thriller called Devious Waters. In addition to her writing, she also has podcasts called Forever Haunted, Bone Chilling Tales To Keep You Awake and A Truly Haunted Podcast where she tells audio ghost stories.