It’s Halloween. You’re bored at work. What’s on your mind?? I know . . . you’re wondering what’s the scariest thing we’ve ever run across when crawling under homes doing foundation repair, right?
Well, you’re in luck because we’ve put together this top 10 list for you.
At Anchor Foundation Repair, we’ve been crawling under homes for 35+ years. I ran across my first scary thing under a home at the age of 13 – some kind of 4-legged skeleton, probably a cat – and decided then and there that I didn’t want to be a foundation repairman like my dad. But alas . . . here we are anyway and I have no regrets . . .
We still run into scary stuff under houses, so humor me and enjoy this *hauntingly accurate* rundown. Check out the 10 most frightening situations we find ourselves in while inspecting and working on your pier and beam foundation home.
Do You Find Creepy Stuff in Crawl Spaces?
When you see staged photos of crawl spaces on foundation repair websites, they all look nice, neat, and clean. That’s *adorable* but I can assure you that is not reality. For some reason, all sorts of frightful stuff – living and non-living – ends up under homes . . . especially older homes.
Keeping out the creepies is a great reason to maintain a clean crawl space, use an appropriate skirting material, and ensure proper ventilation under your home. Big shocker – this does not happen at every home. Things devolve and get out of hand over time resulting in some pretty scary encounters for us in the foundation repair world.
The 10 Scariest or Nastiest Things Happening Under Your Home
Here’s a completely non-scientific ranking of our most terrifying findings under crawl space homes. Even though this is a top 10 list, they’re not really in any order except for that No. 1 item at the end . . . that one’s definitely the most disturbing . . .
10. Snakes – Living, Dead, and Evidence Of
Any snake spied in a crawl space is worrisome at first. This is the main reason that I pause and look around carefully when first entering a crawl space. You gotta see if anything is lurking down there alive.
Living snakes are all scary at first until you can identify them. Once we know they are not venomous, it’s easy to let down your guard. The non-venomous ones are probably doing a great job keeping other critters (mice, rats, etc) out of your crawl space.
Recently deceased snakes are kinda scary because you might be wondering if something bigger and scarier just killed them. And where did THAT thing go?
Snake skins are actually the worst. I was just in a crawl space the other day and found 10 or more *very large* snake skins. You can’t tell what kind of snake the skins come from so you have no idea if the snakes are venomous or not. But when you see a whole bunch of them, it’s like: yikes!
9. Roaches
I. Hate. Roaches. Double period..
This should probably be closer to the number one spot on the list. But then I’d have to go around re-numbering and rearranging everything and well, that would be a lot of trouble.
8. Spiders
Some people strongly dislike spiders and there’s always talk of *burning things to the ground* when a spider is involved. They’re very common in a crawl space. Under-house spiders are so common in fact, that they don’t even phase me at this point.
7. Skeletons
Skeletons of rats, mice, birds, mystery animals – things die. It happens and when it does you can’t help but be a little jarred by a skeleton. It’s obviously been hanging out down there for *a while* already.
What’s worse is finding things that are still decaying (ewwww) rather than already to the point of being straight-up skeletons.
6. Skunks
Running into a skunk in a confined space is more than startling. They may scare you, but you don’t want to scare them or else . . .
5. Tunnels and Burrows
Sometimes unseen things are worse than the visible. What made those tunnels? Who’s burrowing under here and where are they now? Just how big is the thing that’s digging under your house?
Nobody knows what we’re dealing with when you just see disturbed dirt (well maybe some animal expert might, but they’re not under there with me). It’s more than a little hair-raising.
4. Bad Smells
Rank smells rank pretty high on this list. Is that nasty stench coming from some *gasp* broken drain lines?? Is that poop or death or something else that smells like poop or death? Dude, I don’t even want to know . . . much less crawl around in it . . .
I’m starting to feel like I shouldn’t let any of my new hires read this article . . .
3. Dead Flashlight Battery
So I’m crawling around in a crawl space and everything is hunky-dory. Then, my flashlight battery goes out. Sure, it’s probably my own fault that the rechargeable battery is dead, but dang it can be dark.
Now I’ve got to *somehow remember* how to navigate to the exit in pitch blackness. Super un-fun and frankly petrifying – you have to move but really don’t want to. Especially true when you know that one or more of the other items on this list are present.
2. Mystery Sounds
Nothing like those *unaccounted for* sounds to add some spine-chilling excitement to a crawl space inspection. Your mind starts racing and horrifying scenarios start playing in your head. It’s fun stuff trying to figure out what could be making that unidentifiable noise.
1. Children’s Toys
Children’s toys are not generally alarming – except for that Elf on a Shelf abomination. . .
Kids’ playthings found under a home are eerie at best and more than a little nightmarish at worst. You’re like, “How in the world did that get there??”
Sure if it’s a ball, it could roll under there on the right kind of crawl space. But dirty babydolls, infant toys, cars, and trucks . . . are people letting their kids play down here???
Can you literally hear the piercing-shrieking-knife-stabbing sounds right now like I can? Maybe I should go to the ear doctor and get that looked at . . .
Do You Get Scared Going Into Crawl Spaces?
We’ve been doing this foundation repair thing for so long that nothing scares us anymore. As long as we’ve got that flashlight charged up, we can handle it. We’ve seen and done *all the things* and know how to get around the creepy stuff and come out unscathed.
At Anchor Foundation Repair, we know that homeowners worry when they have foundation problems. Not only are you concerned about your home’s safety and stability, but you’re also worried about choosing the right contractor to take care of your largest investment.
When it comes to crawl spaces, the scariest thing is letting your problems go on for longer than you should, resulting in more possible damage and higher repair costs.
Don’t keep cowering in the corner, hoping your crawl space problems will go away on their own (they won’t and could get worse). Check out “Should I Level My Pier and Beam House Now? 6 Good Reasons Not to Wait.”