DH and I were woken up at 3am by a noise above us which we thought was coming from our loft. It was prolonged over about 10 mins. Sounded like something hard being dropped and rolling around and then things being moved about. Then I heard what sounded like a plug being put in to a plug socket. The noise sounded purposeful and like it was human rather than animal. DH got up and hit the ceiling with a pole a number of times and the noise stopped and didn’t start again.
For context, we have had squirrels nest in the loft in the past and have also heard birds from time to time (We’re talking around 10 years ago) so we have experienced animal noise directly overhead before. We had someone from pest control round and we think we have blocked off all access routes from the outside.
Our next door neighbour is a bit of a nightmare. She rents out rooms and has lots of male immigrant types coming and going. There have been many incidents over the years and she/the address is known to the police. At one point I was concerned for her as she seemed to have at least 3 men living there who appeared to be drug dealers. She does not have a loft conversion.
Anyway back to the noise. As I said it felt almost like it was human and controlled rather than coming from an animal. When I told DH that I thought I heard what sounded like a plug in a socket he started to wonder if the noise was coming from next doors loft rather than ours. It would still feel and sound like it’s overhead. It seems weird that it stopped and didn’t start again once DH banged on the ceiling.