How much extra can you demand for performing an exorcism prior to tender?
Often I’ll be taking buyers around to houses in older parts of town and they’ll offhand wonder if anyone died in a house. I usually say “It’s a 100 year old house, it’s pretty likely that someone did”.
Once when we were getting out of the car to look at a vacant house the neighbor ran over to tell us that the house was haunted. We didn’t get any weird feelings in the house and for these clients I think a ghost sighting would have guaranteed a sale.
At a closing once, we were all just chatting while waiting for copies and the topic turned to haunted houses. The other Realtor and the seller, who both had owned a lot of rental properties, had a lot of ghost stories to tell.
Good luck buying any house. I wouldn’t mind a haunted house if it was cheap. What really scares me are mortgage calculators.
I’d keep my mouth shut. If the ghosts want to tell any prospective buyers, that’s up to them.
When I was house shopping ghosts and hauntings were high on my list of dealbreakers. It didn’t help that I was mainly looking at old houses too. There were a few that gave me the jibblies when I toured them, but nothing concrete like disembodied laughing or things floating or anything. The house I’m in now was built in 1916 so I’m sure at least one person’s died in it, but I don’t know anything about that.
As a matter of law, the house is haunted. One of my favorite quotes ever 
ETA: In a brief I wrote I also included a footnote stating that the court determined that “a roof is not a floor.” Close second.
This is one of those cases where the law is an ass. If I claim far and wide that the Loch Ness Monster lives in my bathtub, and lead tours through my house to try to show it off (doggone it, it’s always out at the casinos when I do, so no one ever sees it!), I’m required to reveal my delusions to the buyers? It’s ludicrous.
People new to the area might not know. Yet.
No. The reasons for disclosing things similar to being “haunted” are because the reputation of a house affects its value in multiple ways, even more so if it’s a known tourist spot. Would it affect your decision to buy a house if you knew that people would drive by slowly to gawk at it, ring your doorbell and ask for tours, or other disruptive activities? What if your house used to be owned by the local curmudgeon, and has a much higher probability of getting vandalized? What if your house used to be a drug dealer’s house?
These are all the same type of hidden attribute of the property that can lower (or raise) its value. As such, it’s only fair to the prospective buyer that you share things which may reasonably affect the buyer’s decision. Being “haunted” is one of these – not because of ghostly activity, but simply because the value might be affected by something that isn’t obvious upon inspection.
No disrespect intended, but your second sentence clearly negates your first. If you don’t believe in ghosts, what does the ‘history’ or location of the house have to do with anything ? (smells, blood stained walls, or folks coming by for visits to visit the scene notwithstanding)
And I’m with the other poster - if you don’t believe in ghosts, how can you say they are there to begin with?
I think the real issue would be the other way around - declaring that the property was haunted, true believers buy it hoping to prove it - and can’t. They would possibly have some kind of legal recourse against the seller for promised goods not delivered.
First off, I doubt that is a realistic and common thing, and second they can be dealt with the same way any troublesome person can be dealt with, by posting the property.
What do those things based on real events have to do with delusional people who believe in ghosts? In case this is unclear, we’re talking about imaginary things which do not exist. And are you actually asserting that a person must admit in a seller’s disclosure that they’re a “curmudgeon?” I’m going to need a few citations for that lulu.
So? A lot of things can influence a home’s value. Are you required by law to state proactively how many times your 500-pound neighbour wears a thong in his front yard? Or how many times you’re woken up by blue jays screaming? Or how many times kids draw pornographic Sponge Bob cartoons with chalk on your sidewalk? Seriously, I’ve been through the home buying/selling process a few times, none of those things are expected to be disclosed, yet all could impact the “value” of the property to someone.
Unlike ghosts, which are not real. They are imaginary. They do not exist. The law should not ever be set up to enshrine the delusions of the gullible.
And that’s why I say it may be legal, but it’s bad law.
Opera ghosts are easy. Just play their game, for if Miss Daae sings, the OG is certain to attend. You just make sure the doors are barred and that your men are there and armed. His reign will end!
Which is why you’ve missed the point. You are not legally required to warn a buyer about the ghosts you believe inhabit the property. But you are required to inorm a buyer that the house is a nationally famous haunted house.
It’s not enshrining delusions and gullibility. And it’s not as simple as you’ve made it out to be, either – you have to make reasonable warning to the buyer, and reasonable is a difficult concept to quantify. Your neighbor in a thong? No big deal. The fact that hundreds of people a month will drive by your house and take photos and maybe ring the bell? Dealbreaker.
No, you’re required to reveal the delusions of the crowds of people who are champing at the bit to see your bathtub, because they affect the value of the house.
Just think of it this way - if your house has been ruled as a Superfund site, you have to reveal that to a buyer
even if there are no toxic chemicals there
If you know, for a fact, that there is no contamination whatsoever at the building - it doesn’t matter. It has been declared to be contaminated and you cannot hide that from the buyer. The actual existance or non-existance of those chemicals is completely irrelevant.
There’s no such thing as a haunted house, so there’s nothing to reveal in that regard (and I don’t see how such a thing could possibly be enforceable anyway. In order to prove they held that information back from you, it would first be necessary to prove the house is actually haunted, which is impossible).
I suppose, however, a realtor might sometimes be obligated to warn a potential buyer that a house is a target for gawkers and sightseers.
Merely telling a buyer that previous occupants have imagined they saw “spooky” shit? No. That’s not information about the house, it’s just private information about previous occupants.
There is, legally, if it’s haunted as a matter of law.
I’m sorry, what? What is “haunted as a matter of law?”
A house in Nyack, NY 