To be scared of my neighbour? Weird noises at nights...

[Mikadua23]

So this is going to be very messy and long..
We moved here 2 years ago, we live in 2 semi detached house and our neighbour is on our right.

We live in cul de sac and the area is very quiet and peaceful.
I dont work right now due to taking care of our young child and being pregnant with our second so I am home all days.

My neighbour is a man in his ( I believe 50s)
He is very shy when you try to say hello but usually kind, we don't have problems and never had.
He lives alone and have no family or friends, nobody ever visited him for the last 2 years..
He was always alone on christmas, easter or other celebrations..
We would check on him through the covid situation when he would not leave his house for few days at all and we would do some food shopping for him, he was very happy with the help.
I would give him christmas cards but never had one back (not that I expected him to give one! I have purerly felt sorry for him)
I would also give him a portion of christmas dinner last year and he was very happy although never really came back with dishes , he just left them outside our door 2 weeks after..

Our landlord did say to us when we first moved here, that our neighbour is weird and nobody in the road likes him but I never asked questions.

I wouldn't care about the way He chose to live if not the fact that he works night shifts every other week and every time he leaves the house, you can hear noises from his house like someone is still inside which is odd because he does live on his own.
As I mentioned before...
He never even had a friend coming over...

We share walls and it usually takes about 5 mins after he leaves around midnight and then you can hear someone coming down the stairs inside his house .

I dont know why, I am scared of this man and always find him a bit weird, it shouldn't really be in my intesrest whats happening inside his house but the whole thing is just odd.

Despite all this..

He never goes anywhere except his job where he works 12 hours shifts around 4 times a week.

Your frightened of him, but check on him, do his shopping and give him Christmas dinner!!! So, if he is so terrifying why did you start doing all that? From what I can read here the man has never done you any harm, or anyone else. I think you need to get something to occupy your mind as your imagination is obviously running away with you.

Why dont you tell him you thought you heard someone in his house and that you hope no one broke in. If it's innocent he may just say oh no that would be mother walking around...or the cat...or the ghost...or his hostage.

Seems intriguing, although if say it does seem like there's another person

Next time he's out and you hear the noise, I'd wait until I heard movement and then start knocking loudly and hard on the wall. They'll be able to hear it if you can hear them.

If a hostage they may think to start knocking back to signify they need help, or may call out.

Has he actually told you he lives alone? Or is that just an assumption?

It you don’t hear a toilet throughout a whole 12-hour period then I don’t think it’s a person unless it’s someone with severe MH issues who doesn’t use or flush a toilet.

I’m wondering if he plays a CD or streams a recording of “white noise” or background household noise whilst he’s out to deter burglars. My grandma always used to leave a radio on when see went out because she somehow thought it would scare the burglars away.

Maybe it's a super mechanical sex doll, that can actually walk, and she comes down the stairs for a bit of a breather when the man goes to work. But you can't hear her when he is home,as she is in use.

What kind of shift work does he do? I think I’d call the police, explain and ask for a welfare check. Can’t hurt really

Have you ever heard conversations through the wall?

@Gothichouse40

Your frightened of him, but check on him, do his shopping and give him Christmas dinner!!! So, if he is so terrifying why did you start doing all that? From what I can read here the man has never done you any harm, or anyone else. I think you need to get something to occupy your mind as your imagination is obviously running away with you.

I agree with the above.. How does anyone know if he has visitors or not? If someone else was living there with him, you'd probably hear voices. It is probably a cat. If you are that concerned that someone may be being held hostage, look in his recycling..it's easy to see if someone else is living there by the recycling they create.

I worked for a care company doing home visits we used to go into a woman’s house lets call her mrs Jones … mrs Jones stayed alone in a huge 5 bedroom house she was in her late 80s and her family that stayed else where were very controlling they said she was losing her mind so she was treated as such even by us … she wasn’t allowed in the up stairs of her house and she had had a nasty fall coming down the stairs and her son and daughter locked the rooms up stairs so she couldn’t get into them and installed I toilet with a bath in it down stairs well Any way she used to accuse all the care staff of eating her food and drinking her whisky things like that (and of course we weren’t) she wasn’t allowed to bath alone as she slipped and nearly fell so we were to help bath her and dry bath down before we left so if the care staff came in in the morning or in another point in the day we would know if she had bathed alone and we would need to remind her not to … we would go in in the morning and see a wet bath we would say to her and she would swear blind she wasn’t using the bath alone at night …. She used to put pen parks on her whisky bottle before we would do her tuck down visit to prove someone was drinking her whisky … we assumed it was her and she was forgetting bare in mind we had to report this all back to family witch just fulled the thoughts that she was losing it … anyway the family were trying to get her out into a home so lawyers came out and social workers she told them there was a squirrel living in her loft and she could here it ! She said the squirrel stole her jewellery things like that so this even more made us all think she had to be put in a home (no one had heard said squirrel nor thought to check in loft ) anyway it was winter and mrs Jones asked if I could take her up stairs into her old bedroom to get one of her fur coats as it was getting colder of course I agreed I got the key out the lock box and took her up stairs I unlocked the door and we went into her old bedroom and into her built in wardrobe for a coat she was upset as her old bed was unmaid (I never though anything of it ) I just assumed her son had stayed and left it like that I helped her make it and we went back down stairs I 200% made sure I locked bedroom door behind me I got a call from the office the next day saying the son was extremely angry the found the bedroom door laying open the night I went in I explained I locked it but of course no one believed me I was really upset 2 weeks before this all happened the son had got cctv installed at the front and back door because of cold callers ( she had signed up to a feed the tigers thing ) and he wasn’t happy anyway 2 days after the son called the office me and the 3 other care staff that attended her visits got called into the office the son had checked the cctv the night the door was left open there was a man seen leaving the house they asked us if we had ever seen him before (there was no footage of him entering only leaving ) none of us had seen him any where in or near the house before … anyway it turned out the man had been living in her loft !!! We don’t know for how long the family assume he was waiting till a few hours after the care staff left ( she was given a sleeping pill to help her sleep) and he was coming down stairs having a bath or shower (that’s why bath was sometimes wet even low she had swore she hadn’t used it ) he was helping himself to her whisky and food (found dna on whisky bottle) they found some of her stolen items in loft in and old bread packet that he had left behind it turned out that the wardrobe I was in getting the coat out of was the crawl space to the loft !!! The unmaid bed she was upset about ??? He had been sleeping in it (found his hairs on the pillow) they assume that when I went up stairs to get the coat that I spooked him and he choose to leave because of it (that’s why bedroom door was left open) could only be locked by hand from the inside of the room ! The key had to be used on the outside so yeah … these things do happen I have never felt so guilty in my life ! The poor woman wasn’t nuts

@Babyjune21

I worked for a care company doing home visits we used to go into a woman’s house lets call her mrs Jones … mrs Jones stayed alone in a huge 5 bedroom house she was in her late 80s and her family that stayed else where were very controlling they said she was losing her mind so she was treated as such even by us … she wasn’t allowed in the up stairs of her house and she had had a nasty fall coming down the stairs and her son and daughter locked the rooms up stairs so she couldn’t get into them and installed I toilet with a bath in it down stairs well Any way she used to accuse all the care staff of eating her food and drinking her whisky things like that (and of course we weren’t) she wasn’t allowed to bath alone as she slipped and nearly fell so we were to help bath her and dry bath down before we left so if the care staff came in in the morning or in another point in the day we would know if she had bathed alone and we would need to remind her not to … we would go in in the morning and see a wet bath we would say to her and she would swear blind she wasn’t using the bath alone at night …. She used to put pen parks on her whisky bottle before we would do her tuck down visit to prove someone was drinking her whisky … we assumed it was her and she was forgetting bare in mind we had to report this all back to family witch just fulled the thoughts that she was losing it … anyway the family were trying to get her out into a home so lawyers came out and social workers she told them there was a squirrel living in her loft and she could here it ! She said the squirrel stole her jewellery things like that so this even more made us all think she had to be put in a home (no one had heard said squirrel nor thought to check in loft ) anyway it was winter and mrs Jones asked if I could take her up stairs into her old bedroom to get one of her fur coats as it was getting colder of course I agreed I got the key out the lock box and took her up stairs I unlocked the door and we went into her old bedroom and into her built in wardrobe for a coat she was upset as her old bed was unmaid (I never though anything of it ) I just assumed her son had stayed and left it like that I helped her make it and we went back down stairs I 200% made sure I locked bedroom door behind me I got a call from the office the next day saying the son was extremely angry the found the bedroom door laying open the night I went in I explained I locked it but of course no one believed me I was really upset 2 weeks before this all happened the son had got cctv installed at the front and back door because of cold callers ( she had signed up to a feed the tigers thing ) and he wasn’t happy anyway 2 days after the son called the office me and the 3 other care staff that attended her visits got called into the office the son had checked the cctv the night the door was left open there was a man seen leaving the house they asked us if we had ever seen him before (there was no footage of him entering only leaving ) none of us had seen him any where in or near the house before … anyway it turned out the man had been living in her loft !!! We don’t know for how long the family assume he was waiting till a few hours after the care staff left ( she was given a sleeping pill to help her sleep) and he was coming down stairs having a bath or shower (that’s why bath was sometimes wet even low she had swore she hadn’t used it ) he was helping himself to her whisky and food (found dna on whisky bottle) they found some of her stolen items in loft in and old bread packet that he had left behind it turned out that the wardrobe I was in getting the coat out of was the crawl space to the loft !!! The unmaid bed she was upset about ??? He had been sleeping in it (found his hairs on the pillow) they assume that when I went up stairs to get the coat that I spooked him and he choose to leave because of it (that’s why bedroom door was left open) could only be locked by hand from the inside of the room ! The key had to be used on the outside so yeah … these things do happen I have never felt so guilty in my life ! The poor woman wasn’t nuts

@Babyjune21 oh wow!!! That is just terrifying, good plot for a film! OP I’m very keen to find out what this is - placemarking!!

I have just watched waaay too many criminal documentaries and now tell myself that he probably is an abducter

This seems improbable. Any ‘prisoner’ appears to have complete free reign of the house. So as soon as he leaves they could smash a window, bang on the walls/doors, scream the house down etc.

Also, a person living/hiding in the attic is unlikely as the guy lives by himself. This person must be eating enough to survive! If you live by yourself, surely you would notice food going missing, it’s not like a family of 4/6 where you just assume someone else in the household has eaten it.

Maybe they live with someone with severe agoraphobia?

Also, no idea from what you have written how the guy is odd? Nothing you have written indicates this. Because he works shift work.

Llamasally I can see this happening but it seems a very different situation to a guy of working age who has a job. Just can’t see he wouldn’t notice his food missing and it’s not like he is ‘banned’ from other parts of his house.

@Babyjune21 that's crazy!

I was thinking OP, maybe next time you hear noises, knock and shout over "is everything ok?"

Best case scenario there's noone there and you'll look silly.

But if something sinister is happening, you could save someone's life.

Don't call the police because they'll look in the windows and without obvious disturbance they can't enter. And don't speak to him about it because if he is keeping someone there, then he'll make sure they can't make any more noise.

Plenty of people have used the control they exert over victims to keep them somewhere against their will (I'll hurt your family, I'm getting the neighbours to keep watch on you etc)

In fact in some of the more spectacular cases in the media, it's been shown they've actually taken them outside etc without them asking for help because fear is a great tool for keeping someone in line.

I know you are scared, and I'm sure it's probably nothing. But is it not worth trying if you could help someone?

Poor bloke. Probably just a shy man and there’s a perfectly innocent explanation to everything but as humans we do love to create a drama. He could have a really tragic life story or something that’s left him traumatised so he doesn’t interact with anyone

Your taking an unhealthy interest in this man OP. I think this thread is more a reflection on you than him. He's probably sick of the curtain twitcher next door watching his every move. The poor man is just trying to quietly live his life. He started by describing him as a nice quiet man. Now you've build him up into some sort of terrifying deviant. Based on nothing.

Maybe he doesn't celebrate christmas. I know a very strict christian family that do not celebrate christmas. Many people don't for a variety of reasons. There is nothing odd about that.

So he's not had visitors in 2 years, during most of that time we've not been allowed to have any. I hate visitors in my space. I arranged to meet people outside of it. I don't care what my neighbours think. You say he only goes to work. How the hell do you know that? Are you following him too? He could be volunteering to feed the homeless for all you know.

Maybe he left your plates on your door step because your cooking is shit. He just didn't want to tell you he enjoyed it in case you send him more food.

Or……Maybe there is someone in the house who doesn’t have the right to remain in the country? Although I live rurally you do see neighbours. I once had no less than 10 officers from immigration arrive with a warrant for the wrong house. Turns out they meant to visit a neighbouring property (the people they were interested in used to live in my house). They were looking for someone from a South American country. I’d never seen the person they were interested in even though he apparently lived next door. So you never know, it could be that? Not being held against their will, just super paranoid about being seen? Although risky if that person should ever get ill I guess? 🤷‍♀️

It could well be a cat. It took us a while to get used to how noisy our house is when we first moved here. We dont have floorboards upstairs, more like sheets of ply (only way I can describe it) and they creak and crack at the SLIGHTEST movement. We also have a rather large cat who hops down the stairs in a strange sideways fashion (think both front paws first, both back paws next), it really does sound like human footsteps if you didn't know better. I wouldn't pay too much attention to gossip, I was told stories about my neighbour (by other neighbours) at my last house, frightened the life out of me at the time but it turned out to be nothing but a silly row between them, he never gave me any problems at all.

@PurpleSapphire a cat that runs water? Op says she hears running water when the man leaves? 🤷‍♀️

Didn't see that bit so not a clue. To me it perhaps sounds more like someone who suffers with anxiety and maybe only leaves the house to go to work? Keeping the blind down, not answering the door, tv constantly on etc. Or could be a hoarder, embarrassed about his house. I wouldn't automatically assume anything sinister that's all i'm saying.

Wht do you tbink he lives alone?

Also you say he never returns dishes, and then say he leaves them outside the door. Arw you sure you are not the strange neighbour?

Perhaps he left them outside the door due to social distancing. That's what delivery men were doing at the time. Knock the door, put parcel down and wait halfway up the path. Except he didn't need to wait as obviously op would know what they were and who they were from.