Social landlords use exorcists to deal with supernatural complaints!

Most social landlords take complaints about haunted properties seriously, contacting priests and spiritual mediums, moving people up housing waiting lists and even transferring tenants.

Requests made by Inside Housing to every council in England under the Freedom of Information Act combined with a survey of the 100 largest housing associations revealed that 16 landlords have received 73 reports of ghosts and related paranormal activity.

Nine councils and housing association said they either have already, or would, contact an exorcist or spiritual medium.

A further six have either already moved tenants or said they would be prepared to move tenants that were especially badly affected by alleged hauntings.

Three housing associations also said that their offices were said to be haunted, and Lambeth Council said its town hall was rumoured to be haunted.

The true extent of haunting complaints is likely to be much greater as most councils did not have the information available to respond and only 15 housing associations replied to the survey.

However, of those that responded, all 15 associations said they would treat reports from tenants about ghosts seriously and sympathetically.

Landlords said they took complaints about ghosts seriously because of the impact the stress of experiences had on tenants’ health and because some tenants were especially vulnerable – sometimes having mental health problems.

FOI correspondence revealed examples of family members being prescribed tranquilisers because of stress-induced psoriasis as a result of alleged hauntings.

Sheffield Council, which experienced an incredible 47 complaints of hauntings in the past 10 years, gave one family a priority move to get a council house in the wake of a testimony from a housing officer at the council who claimed to witness paranormal activity in the family’s private rented flat.

Broxtowe Council received two reports of hauntings in its properties over the past decade; phone logs reveal that just last year a tenant complained he had been experiencing ‘paranormal activity’ at his property, where boxes had been ‘flying around the room’.

Similarly, Bromsgrove District and Redditch Borough Council had a property exorcised in January 2007 after a mother believed her child had been possessed.

A spokesperson for 66,000-home Circle Group, which received one complaint of a haunting, said: ‘it was a very serious and delicate matter, as the customer involved was badly affected by the experience.

‘The customer was dealt with sensitively and taken seriously, as we would with any customers concerns – I understand that an exorcism was offered.’

Associations that have not received any complaints about ghosts also said they would take reports seriously.

A spokesperson for 30,000-home Orbit Group said it ‘may facilitate a transfer or a management move if the issue was unresolvable and it was causing distress’.

Similarly, 12,000-home Contour Homes says it would investigate complaints, potentially using recording equipment, and ‘if there was no possible resolution other than moving the tenant this would be considered’.

The UK's Most Haunted!

The UK's Most Haunted...

Always wanted to see a phantom in the 'flesh'? We have picked some of the best witness report spots. You may be pleased to know that a lot of them are in pubs ...

Organisation	Number of complaints about ghosts	Contacted exorcist/spiritual medium?	Consider transferring tenants?
Mid Devon Council	2	no	no
Wales and West Housing	1	yes	yes
Bromsgrove District & Redditch Borough Councils	1	yes	no
Hounslow Homes	3	no	no
Broxtowe Council	2	no	no
Circle Group	1	yes	yes
North Hertfordshire Homes	1	no	no
Fareham Council	1	yes	no
Sheffield Council	47	no	no
Six Town Housing	2	no	no
Gentoo	4	yes	no
Whitefriars	2	yes	yes
One Housing	0	no	no
Thames Valley Housing	1	yes	no
Curo	2	yes	yes
Home Group	2	yes	no
Contour	0	no	no
Bromford	0	no	no
Sovereign	0	no	no
Greenfields Community Housing	0	no	no
Orbit	0	no	yes
Trafford Housing Trust	0	no	yes
Taunton Dean	1	no	no
Lambeth	0	no	no
Total	73	9	6

Nick’s paranormal encounter at the North Hertfordshire Homes office....

Nick’s paranormal encounter at the North Hertfordshire Homes office......

Not only do most organisations treat the paranormal with an open mind, but several even report ghostly goings on at their own buildings. Lambeth says that Lambeth Town Hall is allegedly haunted, while according to local folk law, One Housing Group’s Arlington centre, in Camden which is a combination of accommodation for homeless people, local facilities and a conference centre, is also haunted.

Circle Group and North Hertfordshire Homes even have offices which staff claim are haunted.

Indeed, this very piece is being written from a housing association’s haunted meeting room. Specifically, I am sitting in the Salisbury room of North Hertfordshire Homes Georgian office in Baldock. The office – previously the home of Mary Graves, the mistress of Lord Salisbury – was been long-rumoured to be haunted before North Hertfordshire Homes moved into the refurbished property in 2005. However, some years ago, local medium John Aitkin visited the property and said he sensed four ghostly presences. These were an 18 year old serving girl called Elisabeth, a house keeper called Isobel, a small child called William and Mary Graves herself.

Curious staff have since held a sleep in, and occasionally reporting ‘weird sensations’ and witnessing the image of a woman by the window. As a result, one colleague has even moved desks. Mostly, though, talk of ghosts provokes jovial skepticism.

Typing alone at the board table, the wind howls outside causing the windows fidget against the shutters, and brittle Autumn leaves to tinker against the aging panes. There are no visions, flying objects, changes of temperature or strange presences. It is actually quite cosy. But nonetheless, it is easy to see how the building, with its alcoves, cellars and staircases could set the mind racing alone at night.

Indeed, the cleaners, who occupy the building alone at night were the first to report things going bump in the night. Steve Foulds, building technician at North Hertfordshire Homes, shows me the cleaners’ log of complains which reveals over series of dates in September 2006 ‘a chair spun round twice’, ‘the apparition of a young girl who smiled and then vanished’, hoovers turned off and on and the disabled toilet locking itself.

‘I thought they were real characters [a husband and wife cleaning duo],’ recalls Mr Foulds. ‘They were certainly very sincere in their belief that is what they saw – and sometimes I bump into them in the street and they ask if there have been further instances. Personally, I think it is a very warm, welcoming place to work.’