How Haunted Is This House?
A field guide to understanding the many hauntings of American suburbia
It starts small, and almost as soon as summer is over.
The fall decorations begin to pop up.
A pumpkin set out on a doorstep. A skeleton decal on a front window. A makeshift ghost hung from a mailbox. By the time October rolls around, it’s spread rapidly, and by mid-month, the whole neighborhood is bedecked in autumnal splendor, from the crafty to the clever to the cursed.
There are many approaches to decorating a house for the season, and those approaches can tell you a lot about the house.
Who lives there.
What they value.
What they want to say to the world.
… how haunted they are.
That’s right, I said haunted.
I’ve conducted extensive field research on this subject (read: I have walked the dogs around the neighborhood several times), and after intense study, I’ve been able to identify six major archetypes of October House—and quantify just how haunted each of those houses are.
Let’s review.
Subtle Harvest Splendor
This house is always perfectly put-together, and of course October is no exception.
No one saw the decorations being put up; they simply appeared all at once, a complete work of Instagram-worthy autumnal chic conjured from thin air. Artful piles of pristine pumpkins in a variety of colors. A stylish fall wreath that complements the statement-color front door. Crisp cornstalks lining the balustrade of the porch.
There’s no hint of Halloween’s darker side here, nary a ghost, ghoul or goblin to be seen. They’re not against Halloween, per se, but it just doesn’t fit the color scheme, all those purples and greens and blacks. They’re seeking timeless, and the occult is just tacky.
How Haunted Is This House?
The house—and its occupants—project a year-round image of relentless cheer, but there’s just a whiff of underlying menace. Who could possibly maintain this level of polish at all times? Maybe they really do just have their act together in an enviable way, but there is a small-but-real chance that they are actually undercover assassins, Russian spies, or perhaps even some kind of Terminators.
3.4/10, what’s their deal, anyways
Fun Grandparent Halloween
On precisely October 1st—no sooner, no later—that nice, recently-retired couple who always waves to you while they’re having their evening glass of wine on the porch flips a switch, and turns their always-tidy yard into a happy Halloween tableau appropriate for all ages.
The perfectly-spaced lighting fixtures on their well-manicured front path are swapped out for tiny glowing pumpkins. Their well-tended trees are perfectly wrapped in fake spiderwebs, and a pair of striped-stocking-clad legs stick upright from the mulch, whimsically implying the presence of a witch who has crashed head-first into their Neighborhood Yard of the Month landscaping.
It’s all Very Halloween, and yet unlikely to frighten even the smallest child.
How Haunted Is This House?
Not at all. They have incredible retiree vibes. They give out full-size candy bars on Halloween, and will slyly offer the adults a Solo cup of punch with a wink and a nod. There is nothing to fear here, unless you step on their lawn.
Oh god, did you step on their lawn?
1.6/10, seriously, just stay off the lawn
Army of the Inflatables
If Home Depot sells it, they’ve got it, and it’s plugged into a tangle of extension cords and surge protectors sucking hundreds of dollars in added electric bills into various blowers. There’s a Jack Skellington and a giant spider, a ghost and a spooky tree, a nine-foot Oogie Boogie and the Sanderson Sisters stirring a cauldron.
They don’t have the 12-foot skeleton, but that’s only because the HOA passed an ordinance limiting “outdoor seasonal displays” to a 10-foot maximum height; they not-so-quietly suspect that this ordinance was specifically targeted at them.
(They’re considering buying the skeleton anyways and burying it 26 inches in the lawn to show that know-it-all HOA president, but they’re facing resistance to this idea from within their marriage.)
How Haunted Is This House?
They’re working through something, a problem they don’t quite have the language to explain. It’s like they’re trying to buy a train ticket in a foreign country; they’re getting progressively louder, but not any more well-understood.
In the absence of an emotional breakthrough, though, there are always more inflatables to buy.
They’ve got their eye on a blow-up haunted house that you can actually walk through.
Would really tie the yard together.
5.2/10, is there anything you want to talk about
Tried To Balance Political Yard Signs With Halloween, Failed
You can see how they got there, but you wish they hadn’t. It’s not just Halloween season right now, it’s also election season, and this house couldn’t resist the temptation to express their political beliefs through Halloween decorations.
Perhaps it’s fake gravestones that read “I did my own research” or “Thanks, Brandon!”, or maybe it’s straw-stuffed effigies of politicians they oppose.
Whatever it is, they’re killing the vibe.
How Haunted Is This House?
There might not be actual ghosts here, but it’s best to give it a wide berth nonetheless, just in case they want to talk.
7.2/10, while you’re out in the yard have you considered touching grass
[spooky voice] WELCOME TO THE HELL HOUSE
If you’re looking for store-bought Halloween decorations, they don’t have any.
What they do have are a very particular set of skills, skills that have been used to convert the front of this unassuming suburban ranch home into a full-fledged, bespoke horror house. There are lifelike animatronics and grisly scenes of gore, computer-controlled lights and smoke machines, and an ominous soundtrack synchronized to all of it leaking out of well-concealed speakers.
You’ve seen actual movies in theaters that have spent less on special effects than this house, which neighborhood children are terrified of and neighborhood dogs growl at as they walk past all month long.
How Haunted Is This House?
Surprisingly, not haunted at all. The residents of this house have a hobby that they passionately pursue, one that brings them a great deal of personal satisfaction and inner peace. In nurturing this hobby, they have found a tight-knit community of like-minded “haunters” who have proven to be a tremendous source of emotional support and really helped them get through a few rough patches in their life. They sleep well at night, the only horrors in their dreams the ones that they’ll construct next year.
0.0/10, we should all be so grounded
One Fake Spiderweb on a Bush
Is that it?
Did… did they start to do more, and then get interrupted?
Or was this their entire plan?
Did they go to the store and buy exactly one (1) Halloween decoration and spend thirty seconds stretching it awkwardly across half of a single boxwood shrub on purpose?
It can’t be that simple.
Perhaps they started hanging Halloween decorations and were attacked.
That’s it. They must’ve been attacked by some kind of werewolf or zombie. Ooh, or a vampire! Maybe a killer clown got them, and then that clown left this half-finished spiderweb job up as a warning to the rest of the neighborhood before disappearing down the storm drain to await their next victim.
The possibilities are endless, and frankly, they’re all terrifying.
How Haunted Is This House?
Man, you don’t know what’s going on there. That place is haunted as hell.
9.2/10, a minimalist horror masterpiece
—Scott Hines (@actioncookbook)
How haunted is your house? Think of any I missed?
Sound off!
Growing up my folks would build a haunted walkway for kids to walkthrough on their way to candy at the door. It started as a simple plywood structure with blacklights, painted with blacklight paint for fun, with an attached "cage" with rope bars my stepdad could reach through while wearing a werewolf mask.
Then, my stepsister left beauty school and donated her practice heads, which were given creepy cuts, splashed with paint, and mounted in a row in the walkway: 4 heads, and a cutout area where someone can stand and appear to be one of the wall heads. Nothing scares an 8 year old more than a cheery "Hi how ya doin'!?" from what they thought was a fake head. Endless enjoyment for myself and my teenage friends running the "haunted house" for my folks.
OK, first, how personal was that bit about burying the 12-footer 26 inches deep? (DO ITTTTTTTTTTTT)
Oddly enough, I think we are grandparent haunted. Decorations went up Saturday, though, so we were behind schedule (Sorry, I was exhausted and flying solo on 10/1). We inherited nearly all of the decorations from an elderly neighbor who admitted that she was too old to be taking boxes from storage, setting up, tearing down, etc. The biggest factor each year that motivates me to decorate is knowing that as she drives by she gets to see that her gift is being put to good use. The kids love it, too.
Sadly, we are in a neighborhood that is rapdily aging into fuddy-duddydom, so there's only like two or three other houses that do more than a sticker in the window.