If These Walls Could Talk
Some friends of mine just discovered that a house they recently bought was the site of a near-murder six months ago. Evidently, the previous owners had some marital trouble. The husband beat the wife to a pulp with an aluminum baseball bat. Now he's awaiting trial for attempted murder.
My friends, a newly married couple, found out about the incident from one of the neighbors. The woman who sold them the place is the mother of the bat-wielding husband; she didn't happen to mention the assault in her sales pitch. Shortly after my friends learned about the case, they found a section of carpet in the bedroom mottled with bloodstains.
At any rate, they're still forging ahead with the purchase. As for me, I don't think I'd be able to move into a place where I knew murder -- or near murder -- had occurred. I'm not certain why, exactly. I am slightly superstitions, I suppose, but my hesitation with living in such a house isn't about evil spirits or the like. I think it would just be unsettling to be sitting on the sofa and ponder the image of a guy in the same room clubbing his wife mercilessly.
So, just curious ... how would you feel about living in a home where a murder took place?
posted by Chase McInerney @ 12:02 AM
8 comments
8 Comments:
I don't think I could live in a home where a murder took place, but I'd be less concerned with a near murder situation. Death has spiritual implications to it. Not that I would expect a ghost, but the knowledge that someone's consciousness was driven from earth violently seems considerable more ominous.
I love your site and I'll have to come back. I'm a new Oklahoma blogger and I'm having fun reviewing the okiedoke.com nominees. You have movie reviews, and that makes me happy. :-)
I really don't mind living in a house where a murder took place.
And lately, I don't even have to get blood on my hands to masturbate and pray. It's a win-win.
You're a very, very lucky man, Pants.
In Ohio, by law, a Realtor must disclose such incidents prior to sale. (Likewise, a death from AIDS...as nonsensical as that is).
If the price was right, I'd have no problem living in a house where a murder happened. I've seen them here go for a song...thinking in particular of a lovely home on about 20 acres near my parents'. Two murders. First, a kid stabbed a teenage girl to death after the girl's father let the troubled boy stay with them. A few months later, ex-wife of the father comes back with her coked up boyfriend and kills the father. Weird. This was probably a $500k house that sold for half its value. (one of the murders was in the barn out back).
I love old houses...the original part of my parents' home was build in 1843 (and a guy hung himself in the barn about 50 years ago)...and our house is a baby, born in 1923. Anything that old is bound to have a history.
Now, I wonder how many of us are living in houses where murder may have taken place and we just don't know it...perhaps it was never discovered...
Hmmmm
I agree with Anonymous. Old houses have history and character, and that's part of what makes them interesting.
If you can prey on others superstitions and get a great deal, all the better. Your friends might do well to express some reservations at the news, and maybe they could get the price knocked down a bit.
In Texas it's mandatory to tell if a violent crime happened under the Full Disclosure Law.
In my town everyone knows where a person gets killed...we're not too big and just small enough to know all the news.
I don't think I would knowingly want to live there without having the house blessed. And I'm not even Catholic.
As one of the (still) anonymous friends, I just want to say that the only issue that would concern me would be if bat-brainer was selling under duress and might be out later and angry about the sale. Other than that, I'm not too worried about what did or didn't happen. I feel badly for the woman and think bat-brainer should be locked up, but one doesn't want to become spiritually co-dependent.
I want to point out that under Oklahoma real estate law, the seller did not have to disclose this information. But that is barely on the list of problems. The mother of the bat-braining accused is selling the property even though the divorce judge has frozen all large sales pending the criminal trial and even though in Oklahoma it takes one to buy (bat-brainer) and two to sell if you are in a civil(?) marriage. The beaten has to sign a quit claim deed (she's waiting on an offer from bat-brainer). We are a long way from out of the woods on this one.
On-going discussion topic: If you'd been hit with a bat and had permanent injuries as a result, would you sign the quit claim deed?
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