There’s no telling what will happen when you walk into someone else’s home. Some people will have an abundance of pets (or wild animals kept against their will), others will answer the door in nothing more than a bikini. Whatever happens, certain situations are bound to stick with you for life.
#1 Tube City
I'm a face painter who does children's birthday parties. I've never had any super sketchy experiences, just a few run-down homes, but the kids always have fun. I went to one house, which was kind of messy and smelly, but it wasn’t a big deal. I started setting up my supplies and I heard a weird peeping above me. I looked up to see a guinea pig running through a clear plastic tube attached to the ceiling. Then I took a good look around the house and noticed the whole place is covered with a network of guinea pig tubes. The mom noticed me looking around and nonchalantly told me they had 10 guinea pigs.
#2 Look at All Those Chickens
I used to deliver oxygen to people's homes and I saw plenty of weird things. There were a lot of hoarders, but this one took the cake. He didn't want to let us into his house, but I had to do a home safety assessment before I could set up the equipment. He was anxious about letting me in because his house was a mess. Come to find out, it wasn't just messy… it was filled with 200 chickens. He was proud of his show chickens and wouldn't let them live in a barn or coop. The smell was unbearable. Other than that, he was a super nice guy.
#3 Box Forts
I do food bank delivery to homebound elders. I always fill two banana boxes of all types of food and deliver them to this one guy’s house. One time, after delivering to him for three years, I had to go inside because he hurt his foot. I saw that he had never thrown out a single box. They lined every wall and entrance. He built a castle around his bed and a series of paths through his house. It was like those pillow forts you would make as a kid, but with boxes. I asked him if he wanted help getting rid of them and he said no. He said that it was fun and helped with his dimension. He's super fun.
#4 Like Nothing Happened
I’m an electrician and I was troubleshooting a bad outlet in the bathroom of a former NFL player. I was taking all the outlets apart when he came in and started talking football. We were in the middle of talking when he just walked over to the toilet and started going number two. I couldn’t see him, but there was just a little pony wall between us. He didn’t even stop telling his story, it was crazy. I walked out because of the smell, but he came out a little later and it was like nothing ever happened.
#5 Tipped Ten Dollars
I delivered pizza for about two years. I had to deliver to a local motel pretty frequently. One day, I went to deliver and a large lady, I’m talking 6’0” and 220 was decked out in dominatrix attire. She answered the door then immediately closed it and threw a robe on. She apologized profusely and then tipped me $10 for the situation.
#6 Buckets of Butts
Long ago, I did estimates for fire and water damage repairs for a restoration company. This couple had a smallish fire in their bedroom. When I entered the home, it was seemingly normal, but smelled like smoke. They took me to the bedroom and it was the mattress that had endured the majority of the fire, along with some of the wall above the head of the bed and smoke damage to the ceiling.
Next to each side of the bed were 10-gallon buckets filled to the brim with butts, and hundreds of spilled over butts all over the floor. I was just in awe how they could live like this in their bedroom, especially since the rest of their home seemed tidy and normal. It was also completely beyond me why they wouldn't clean that up after the fire if for no other reason than insurance adjusters being able to blame them (rightly) and possibly not pay out.
#7 Calling a Time Out
My boyfriend is a locksmith. During the 2008 recession, Las Vegas had thousands of homes that were getting repossessed or abandoned. The company he worked for would have him go and change the locks to keep people out, and it usually happened in the middle of the night to limit the possibilities of running into owners.
I sometimes tagged along, mostly to explore some of the ridiculously big houses that people had just left, but helped some of the time. This one house looked totally normal from the outside. But inside, in every room, there were those “time out” dolls. If you have never seen them, it’s a doll that stands against the wall with its hands up to its face (and even more creepy, they usually have no face) but they look like a kid hiding their face or pouting after being put in a time out.
When I say they were in every room, I mean every single room . And not just one, but dozens, lining the walls. Not laying down, but standing up against every wall of the house. The house’s electricity had been shut off, so all we had was flashlights. Walking into each room did not make it less creepy. He was already afraid of dolls and that made it so much worse. All together, we counted 63, but there might have been more.
#8 Crammed Full
My uncle is a handyman and he went in to do some work for a family. When he got inside their house, he saw that their toilet was stuffed with… well, I’m sure you can imagine. It also wasn’t like someone didn't flush, rather nobody did and the bowl was just crammed full, which had clearly been an accumulating scenario.
#9 Surprise in the Suitcase
I used to work pest control and I once went into student accommodation to deal with insects. This one room was fairly clean, but we had to spray all fabrics with the chemical in question to prevent any eggs from having a safe space to gestate. So, we opened up suitcases, wardrobes, that sort of thing. One suitcase was full of used feminine hygiene products that she was saving for... who knows what reason. Actually, I don't want to know. I didn't mention it. I just did the job and tried to avoid eye contact at the end.
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#10 They’re Coming Onto Us
I did a carpet cleaning job with my uncle once. He asked the owners to move heavy stuff around so he could clean. The dining room table in this one house was covered with packaging labels. I eventually looked behind the table and saw a bunch of adult entertainment. I then went into the master bedroom and found much of the same. My uncle shook his head and said, "I told them we were going to be everywhere. You think they're coming onto us?"
The biggest kicker came when we went into the adult son's bedroom. We saw pretty much the same stuff with some additional contraband. My uncle just shook his head and went to grab something, but like a mummy from its coffin, a girl rose from underneath the blankets on the bed. She was almost entirely without clothing and casually walked away into the hallway.
#11 Women’s Clothing
I used to do flooring and when we had to get up the sub-flooring due to water damage. Underneath it, there was a black garbage bag. When I opened the bag, it had a bunch of women’s clothes in it. I didn’t think anything about it until we dumped it out and found ripped underwear and torn dresses. We told the owner we had forgotten some stuff at work and wouldn’t be back until tomorrow. We then called the police and never went back. The house was soon up for sale a month or so later.
#12 Two Sides of the Story
I actually read a post about a girl with social anxiety who hid under her bed when the plumbers came. Of course, the plumbers caught her under there. After they saw her, she ran and hid in the bathroom until they left. I wonder if those plumbers are on reddit. I most definitely want to hear their side of the story.
#13 What Was Once White
My brother used to work at a pharmacy that helped install equipment into people’s homes like special beds and chairs. He had to install parts for this bed for this lady who was homebound due to her being far too large to exit her home and function in society normally. Her last bed broke because the handles to help her move had been bent too badly from her using them.
So, when my brother went to go check out what they could replace or get from the old bed, he had to lay down to check under it. He mentioned that the carpet seemed off the whole time he was there, but he didn’t know why until this very moment. His hand squished against the once formerly white carpet that had been stained with old number ones. He couldn’t leave and had to inspect the old bed before putting the new stuff in. He ran home and washed himself for like 30 minutes.
#14 A Puzzling Situation
I was a firefighter at another time in my life. I had a middle of the night call to a mobile home for an elderly lady once. We walked in and it was dark, but as my eyes started to adjust I thought, “That's weird wallpaper.” I kept looking around thinking, "Huh, it's on the ceiling too.” It was a weird, inconsistent pattern. My eyes adjusted some more while we were talking to her. She had hundreds of puzzles that she glued when completed to every surface of her mobile home. The walls, ceiling, living room, bedroom, every square inch was covered.
#15 Unwanted Pet
I was a paramedic in Oakland. Once, I was in a home where a child had been bitten by a rat in her crib. As we were standing there talking to the mother about her options, a rat walked up to one of the firefighters and bit his boot. The firefighters knocked it off and the rat was taken to the health department for testing. That was a strange situation.
#16 Pardon the Teeth
I delivered pizza, but for older customers, I’d always go into their homes to bring it inside for those who needed it. One time, I delivered to this lady who was covered in cat hair and the inside of her house was rancid. I couldn’t go in there without holding my breath every time. One time, I went and in her kitchen she had a paper plate with what looked like teeth. I mean a lot of teeth, all different colors, shapes and horrifically repulsive. I don’t know whose teeth they were.
#17 All Eyes On You
I was a carpet cleaner. Probably the weirdest and most disturbing instance was the gay couple who had an entire room of framed photos of them in different positions and outfits. They liked to watch while I cleaned that room. I kept my eyes low and didn't focus on any specific one or make eye contact with them. They tipped well, though, so I kept my mouth shut for the most part and just made sure when their address came up that I always got that job.
#18 Bikini Model
I’m a fire alarm inspector. I was working in a cheap long-term hotel and knocked on a door where a larger man, dressed in a purple bikini opened the door, half-asleep. I entered to test the smoke detector and tried to keep my eyes off the rest of the room. The detector then decided to not alarm in a timely fashion, so I was just staring at the wall, hoping the alarm would set so I get out of the room.
#19 In the Basement
This didn’t happen to me, thank God, but my friend’s mom is a realtor. This one time, she went to check out a small room in the basement of the house she was trying to sell. She opened the door and… the floor and walls were completely covered with cave crickets. She closed that door and immediately called an exterminator.
#20 Water Ration Cans
I once helped renovate an old building that was a house, but converted to a business and was super run down when my employer bought it. We did a ton of work including removing subflooring and ceilings. We found a hidden cellar in the back suite and the thing was filled with trash and random odds and ends. There were GI water ration cans dated from 1956. In the middle suite, we kept finding spoons in the ceiling as we were taking it down.
#21 What’s Mine is Yours
I’m a real estate photographer. This one client was wealthy and had a very nice home. She and her husband were home while I was shooting and I asked the woman if I could remove her pink robe, which was hanging on the shower door. She replied, “Feel free to put it on.” It caught me off guard, but I just moved it aside. I kept moving through the house to shoot and I told her I was about to wrap up, but needed to photograph her walk in closest, to which she replied, “Try on anything you want.” I didn’t take her up on her off, finished the shoot and left.
#22 Worth the Loss
I’m training to be a residential property appraiser in Miami, FL. The guy I work for does everything from $10+ million mansions and foreclosures. A good rule in the business is to never open the fridge in a foreclosure. It’s no longer ‘07, so most foreclosures we run into are old people who have no family and can’t take care of themselves.
The worst thing I’ve seen is a hoarder. The appraisal was for a refinance on his property. The place stunk and we couldn’t get into half the rooms because the doors were boarded up. He also had a ton of dogs. The guy was super confused about why we were there and said his bank guy told him the appraisal fee was about three times what we normally charge.
Luckily on that one, we basically told the bank that it looked as if this guy’s “bank guy” was trying to scam the dude without explicitly saying so. After hearing our report, they thankfully canceled the appraisal. We didn’t wind up getting paid for it, but me and my boss agreed the bad karma was worth the loss.
#23 Getting Some Help
I used to do crisis mental health assessments to determine if the person needed to be forced to the hospital. One person was paranoid that his bathroom was contaminated and that black tar from cigarettes would rain down on him if he went in there. So, he'd go to the bathroom in a bucket and hadn't showered in months. He also had at least 200 empty cartons of goat milk because that was the only thing he'd eat. Yeah, we took him to the hospital.
#24 Fried Alarm Panel
I was installing alarm systems and one day, I went out on a service call. I stepped into a literal cesspool and thanked god for my plastic booties to protect my shoes from walking on their disgusting carpet. I was shown to the alarm panel and when I pulled the panel off the wall to see why it was not powering on, an army of roaches started scurrying out of the wall. Turns out, the panel was fried because several roaches had electrocuted themselves on the circuit board.
#25 Father Time
I once saw a hoarder who lived with a bunch of geese… in the house… and would speak to them constantly. They would always bite her. She owned a very large home and she moved into the guest house to rent the big one out. She was flighty in the brain and a tiny, frail old thing. She left me standing in a hallway full of piles of newspapers topped with pots and pans.
I just stood there and was looking at these old photos in the hallway. I asked her who that person was and she replied, "They’re of me, dear." She used to be drop-dead gorgeous ! She was some sort of old actress or model. I just looked at the pictures, then her, then the pictures. That's when it hit me how cruel Father Time can be. Then she yelped as another goose bit her.
#26 Wearing Something Cute
I was a carrier for the post office and when you first start, you only have one route once a week. Every other day, you cover for someone who calls in sick or went on vacation or something like that. So one day, I covered for a different carrier who was sick. I got to one house and they had four packages. On the front door, there was a sign that read, “Please don’t knock or ring. Just open the door and leave the packages behind the door.” I thought it was weird, but it must have happened a lot because the sign was old and dusty.
I opened the door and went into the house, which seemed normal. I bent down to put the packages down neatly, but as I rose up, there was an old dude who had to be 60 to 70, just standing there in tight jeans and a tight tank top with a clearly dyed jet black mustache. I naturally got scared for a second and told him, “Sorry, you scared me. I didn’t see you there.”
Then he just said, “That’s because I wasn’t here.” So I just said, “Well, I’m sorry” and started to leave. Before I could go, he said, “Hold up. Where’s the other carrier?” I said that I was filling in because she was sick. His words — verbatim — were, “ Nice. Maybe she should stay sick for a while. I’ll make sure to wear something cute tomorrow” I fake laughed and got out of there.
#27 The Only Photo
This isn’t necessarily weird or disturbing, but this has always stuck with me. I used to deliver pizzas and I delivered to this elderly couple once. The lady answered the door in a nightie and was wearing one sock. She was taking her time to get her money, so I browsed around their setup inside. The only thing they had hung up on their wall was a 5x7 photo of Abraham Lincoln. That's it.
#28 Proof of Delivery
I'm a delivery driver for a supermarket. I went to a house once, knocked on the door and he yelled to come in and put everything in the kitchen. When I went in and there was framed adult material throughout the house. Before I left, I had to get him to sign my handset to prove delivery. This 500-pound man was on his bed with just a rag covering himself!
#29 A Gentle Scolding
I used to do a lot of in-home catering. One day, I was delivering some platters and a kid ran out the front door. He looked to be about three or four. He trucked off right down the driveway, heading to the road. I jogged up behind him with a fruit platter in one hand, grabbed his arm with my free hand, and walked him back to the house. When I told his mother what had happened, she just smiled and lightly scolded the child, with one of those "...you know you're not supposed to go near the road" comments.
#30 Oh, That’s Nothing
I was doing a mural on a wall for the apartment of one of my best friend’s brothers. It was my first time going to his place after knowing him for a little over 15 years. To my surprise, he had maybe 10 of those Rubbermaid bins with snakes in them. They were just laying in the living room, all kinds of snakes from different breeds, colors, and sizes. When I asked him about it, he said, “Oh that's nothing.” He then took me into another room where there were glass tanks everywhere. There had to be nearly 40 snakes in his apartment.
#31 Say Hello to My Little Friends
I used to help deliver furniture for my grandfather's upholstery business. One day, we were delivering a couch to a rather expensive looking home. Right as we walked into the front door, there was a floor to ceiling glass case built into the wall that was about 12 feet long and 10 feet tall. It was filled with those glass dolls of varying sizes. A few of them were at least four feet tall. Each one had a different outfit on. What made it extra creep was the fact that all of the dolls were angled so that they were looking at the front door. The only person who was home was a 75-year-old man.
#32 Well, That’s New
Back in the day, I used to help install shutters in people’s homes. You know how normally, people have a picture frame with like a big picture in the middle of someone’s face and then smaller pictures of them around it? Yeah, this one person had small pictures of the person around a big picture of their feet.
#33 Land of Garbage
It was disgusting. The people were extremely nice, but I felt like I was going to vomit. I could barely walk, there was garbage everywhere. I don't know how it wasn’t considered a biohazard. There was a month-old microwaved dinner sitting out, dishes of old food everywhere, and a faintly distinguishable trail that led to the kitchen, which is where we needed to go. Not to mention, they were both barefoot and the wife was missing all her toenails.
#34 Day in the Life
I’m a social worker and visit people in their homes. Most of my clients are mentally ill and need help in their day-to-day life. I had one client who had a psychotic break and was crouching on top of his wardrobe making wolf sounds. It scared the daylights out of me! I really thought he would jump down on me or something.
#35 Seven Years Later
I don’t go into homes, just backyards (I’m a pool dude). You can easily tell who’s a hoarder or a creep. The worst I’ve had is dealing with a guy who was trapping neighborhood cats. It left me very disturbed and I don’t even know if animal control followed up on it. That was almost seven years ago and I still get upset about it.
#36 Living Memorial
I worked as a maid on my own for a year. I was dusting in the living room when I came across shelves with dozens of pictures of this one boy throughout his life. I figured he was a doted-on, only child, until I saw a plaque. It had his name, birthday and the day he passed away on it. The family had a teenage son who lost his life the previous year. Later on, when I went to look for a mop, I opened a door thinking it was the supply closet. It was the boy’s room, left exactly as if he was still living there.
#37 In Need of Disinfectant
I don’t go to other people’s houses for a living but my mom does because she’s a home physical therapist. A lot of times she goes to people's houses to find out that they’re such hoarders that she can’t even get inside. The worst one was one time when she went to a house that was covered in human waste. She had to disinfect herself as soon as she left the house.
#38 Don’t Go in There
I work as a hands-on customer support for electronics. I went to a pretty nice house that didn’t look off at all, so I didn’t think anything of it. I rang the doorbell and this 6-something-year-old guy opened the door to let me in. The problem was that he needed help installing a brand new flat screen TV in his bedroom. I asked where it was and he told me to just go down the hall.
There were three different rooms (one being a bathroom), so I didn’t know which one it was. I grabbed the knob of this one door to the left and asked, “Is this it?” He immediately cried out, “Don’t open that door!” in a very angry manner. The way he said it made it sound like he was hiding something. The rest of the time I was there, I was scared of what was behind the other door.
#39 Indoor Farm
My father’s a chimney sweep and from time to time, I work with him when he needs me. To this day, the weirdest thing that I’ve ever seen on the job happened two years ago. We pulled into the driveway to this farm, nothing weird so far, but once we got out and went inside to check out the fireplace, we saw that the house was filled with farm animals. It was rather interesting seeing them live that close to their farm animals. Their reasoning was that they were just really comfortable with them. Everything else was completely fine, they were nice folks, and it seemed like a successful farm. It smelled so bad, though.
#40 The Coolest Tub Ever
I worked as an electrician for a company that worked with discos and clubs. One time, we were hired to do a club. When we got there, we realized that it was a swingers club and our boss didn't mention it. It was one of the most disturbing yet ingenious things I have ever seen. There was this bathtub in one of the rooms with a little red button. If someone pressed a tile on the floor, it opened and up from the floor came a stand with a bottle of champagne, two glasses and 10 different whips. I'm not even embarrassed to say that I have wanted one for my own place ever since I saw it!
#41 Spider Heaven
I once got a service call about a homeowner's power being out. So, I went over and checked a few lights and plugs before heading for the panel. There was a sour, smoky smell as I got near, which was very different from the ozone smell I'm used to. When I took the cover off, the smell was stronger but everything seemed okay.
That is until I saw a hint of soot from behind one of the breakers. I pulled the breaker out and was greeted with dozens of exploded baby spiders and burnt webbing. Apparently, when the little ones hatched, they started dragging safety lines behind them and as soon as enough of them got onto the bus bar, it shorted through the silk. The spark then sent them all to spider heaven.
#42 Backing Out
I used to be a housekeeper in college. I went to a lady’s house one day and she literally had dog waste on the floor. There was also trash everywhere and the toilet bowl was pretty much completely black. You couldn't see the floor in her room due to the amount of clothes on it either. I didn't clean that house.
#43 The Perfect Snapshot
I'm a carpenter and I got a job to do some work on an old house owned by an elderly lady who had passed away. The house was a perfect snapshot of the 1960s and had some really cool stuff in it. The weird part is that in almost every room there were mannequins fully dressed in ‘60s clothes in various "scenes.” It was really bizarre.
#44 Hidden Room
We weren’t on the job, but I was shadowing my friend for a home inspection for this house he wanted to buy. We went to view this multi-million dollar beautiful home. When we got to an amazing basement with a full bar, bedrooms, pool table, etc. However, there was one semi-hidden wall door. When we opened the door, it was a small room with a single light bulb in the center and a wooden chair bolted to the floor. It was very strange.
#45 Piles of Trash
I’m working on a junk truck as a summer job before I go back to school in a few weeks. I haven’t been doing it for too long and still managed to see something insane. I was cleaning out a house that a hoarder had been living in. There were a bunch of rats under piles of trash, which was a pretty horrific sight.
#46 Strange Pet
I used to work for a Rent -A-Center long ago. I once showed up at some dude's house to pick up his stuff because he was overdue. He had a raccoon in a dog kennel cage. He asked us to say he wasn't home in exchange for the raccoon and cage. We said no and took his living room set. Yeah, it was not a tame raccoon.
#47 Token of Gratitude
I was a pizza driver and an old guy kind of held me hostage for an hour. He was really partied out and all I did was step into his room to give him his pizza and he shut the door. He then wouldn't let me leave until I took all of these gifts he was trying to give me. But, I wasn't supposed to accept any gifts like that, so I was telling him no. But he wouldn't let me leave. I had two other deliveries in my car that I had to deliver, so I was getting anxious about him and also having pizzas needing to be delivered. Eventually, he let me go, but it was still weird.
#48 No Computers Here
I worked for an in-home computer repair company and got an assignment in a bad area. I arrived 10 minutes early and knocked on the door. A lady said that there were no computers there. No question it was the right address, no possibility of mistake. I got back in my car and high-tailed it out of there as I was certain it was a setup for a burglary. I think I arrived early enough that they weren't ready. I told my boss I wasn't going back to that location and to not send any other techs, either. That job wasn't worth my life.
#49 In the Floors
I once helped an elderly lady clean out her home (moving boxes, sweeping, that sort of thing). She had a cockatoo that had its own perch stand in the corner of the living room. However, the cockatoo didn't have a place to go to the bathroom, or at least he never bothered to use it. So underneath the perch stand, all over the floor, was just splatters of bird droppings completely dried and embedded into the wooden floor. I can't imagine that there are people in this world who are okay with living with that spread around their house.
#50 Head to Toe
I was a pizza man for awhile. This one time, I delivered a pizza to a nice area of town and the house itself was huge. The guy who answered the door was fully clothed and nice. But he was also completely covered in Vaseline to the point that it was basically dripping off of him. I had to throw out the pen he used to sign because it was soaked in it.
