This page contains scary stories from the real life of people who dared to visit abandoned houses, villages, factories, castles and other buildings abandoned by their inhabitants. These stories were partly sent by our readers, and partly we translated the stories of foreign diggers for you. But we want to warn you right away - you should not visit such places! It is very dangerous. And if you are also impressionable, don’t read these scary real stories at all!
Scary stories about houses
Abandoned houses, old factories, empty premises - all this attracts diggers and thrill-seekers! We have heard and read so many stories - exciting and creepy - on the Internet. Some stories are reality, others are fiction. Will an inquisitive reader be able to distinguish one from the other?
All stories about abandoned houses can be divided into several categories:
- city's legends
- digger stories
- historical facts
- legends and tales
Urban legends about abandoned buildings
This is a kind of folklore that was formed in a modern society among young people. As a rule, these are scary stories passed from mouth to mouth, transformed under the influence of retelling and changing bizarrely from storyteller to storyteller. Very often, urban legends are tied to a specific place - and as a rule, it is an old abandoned building in which something happened to a friend or just an acquaintance of the storyteller.
Digger stories
This type of scary stories about abandoned buildings is frightening in its realism. Diggers are serious, seasoned dungeon explorers who inspire trust because they are a priori unlikely to lie. Although...trust, but verify. Very often there are stories from diggers in which people simply describe their uncomfortable feelings in one place or another underground. Sometimes the visions that follow the discomfort are described. In general, read for yourself.
Historical facts
Every abandoned castle or old building is associated with some real historical fact, usually leading to the development of paranormal activity. Sometimes it is the sudden death of one of the inhabitants, sometimes it is murder, sometimes it is unhappy love. Based on this historical information, any visitor to the old house can explain the source of the strange and terrible events that he witnessed.
Legends and tales
Folklore associated with a specific abandoned place (house, bridge, tower, lighthouse). This is not yet a fact, that is, these events are not confirmed by any evidence or evidence, but information about them was passed down from generation to generation, from father to son, and looks very reliable. That's what they say...
All these places were once filled with people living their lives. Abandoned for various reasons, they now look like ghost towns or horror movie sets. The mysterious mood of these places makes you feel fear, curiosity and delight at the same time. Only the bravest can dare to visit such a place!
Ghost Town of Bodie, California, USA
The now abandoned city was founded in 1876, when miners discovered rich reserves of gold and silver here. In search of wealth and better life people were traveling to a small town. 
It soon gained a reputation as a "sin city", full of brothels and bars. Residents went bankrupt, and by the forties of the twentieth century, Bodie became a ghost town. It is now considered one of the best preserved towns of its type in the world. 
Prison in Pennsylvania, USA
This prison was used from 1829 until 1971. Even the most famous criminals in America ended up here; for example, Al Capone was kept here. 
After the prison was closed, it became a state landmark and museum, open for guided tours and exhibitions. 
Railway station in Częstochowa, Poland
The railway system in Częstochowa in southern Poland was created during the golden years of industrial development. These days, this abandoned station represents one of the most mysterious places in Europe. 
Ghost Tower in Sathorn, Thailand
In the early nineties, Thailand experienced the largest economic boom in history. At this time, authorities and businessmen demonstrated stability; financial success led to the emergence of many ambitious construction projects, including a skyscraper in Sathorn. 
However, the Asian financial crisis soon occurred and the Thai economy was destroyed. Continued construction was cancelled. 
On this moment the further fate of the building remains unknown: reconstructing it will cost more than building a new one. In addition, the tower has a reputation as a place inhabited by ghosts. 
North Brother Island, USA
From 1885 until the end of the thirties of the twentieth century, Riverside Hospital treated diseases requiring quarantine: measles, typhoid, scarlet fever, leprosy. After this, the center was used to rehabilitate people with heroin addiction. 
In 1963 it was closed. Now no one lives on the island except birds. The hospital building is still there, but could collapse at any moment, with all the windows broken and paint peeling off the walls. 
Devil's Mountain, Germany
This reminder of a bygone era is located on the top of a mountain in west Berlin. There was once a Nazi military school here. After several unsuccessful attempts to blow up the building, the Allies decided to fill it with debris left over from the bombing. 
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, the abandoned building had many owners. Among them was even David Lynch, who wanted to organize yoga courses here. The Berlin authorities refused this proposal. 
Miranda Castle, Belgium
During the French Revolution, Count Liedekerke-Beaufort, a Belgian political activist, was forced to leave the castle with his family. They moved to a farm nearby. 
After World War II and until the end of the eighties, the castle belonged to the state railway company and was used first as a shelter, and then as Kid `s camp. In 1991, due to the high cost of maintenance, the castle was abandoned. 
Kijong-Dong, North Korea
It seems that this Korean village was purposely built to remain empty and uninhabited. It is located near the border with South Korea. After the conflict in 1953, the North Korean government decided to use the village as a propaganda tool: it is the only one visible from the South, which means everything should look perfect. 
The authorities say that ordinary residents live in the village, but there is not even glass in the windows. In the evenings, the lights come on in all rooms at the same time. This is a fake village! 
Fordlandia, Brazil
This place was founded by American entrepreneur Henry Ford in 1927 when he began his urban project. There was to be a rubber tree plantation that would extend into the Amazon rainforest. Ford came up with the idea of a corporate city with all the amenities, swimming pools, golf courses, bungalows and even a place to dance. 
However, local residents did not accept the idea and refused to accept the ban on alcohol. Brazilian workers and American industrialists found themselves in a conflict situation. In 1930, a riot broke out in one of the cafeterias. The cars were thrown into the river and the managers were driven away. After this, the city was abandoned forever. 
Abandoned cinema, Sinai desert
Locals say the cinema was built by a wealthy Frenchman who was walking in the desert with friends and thought the only thing he was missing was a movie. He bought a generator, a hundred chairs and a huge screen in Cairo. Everything was ready for the show, but local residents I didn't like the idea at all. They broke the generator and it was all over before it could have started. As a result, in the heart of the desert there is still a white screen on which not a single film has been shown. 
Varosha, Cyprus
In the early seventies of the last century, Varosha was popular tourist area with luxurious beaches where celebrities and millionaires vacationed. At that time, Cyprus was loved by Brigitte Bardot and Elizabeth Taylor. 
Everything changed in August 1974, when Turkey captured and occupied the northern part of the island. Fifteen thousand residents of the area fled from the invaders, leaving their homes. Many planned to return, but the political situation did not allow them to do so. 
Abandoned hotel, Colombia
The once luxurious Hotel Del Salto, located near the waterfall, was built in 1924. Over time, the Bogota River became more and more polluted, and as a result, tourists gradually lost interest in the region. 
In addition, many suicides choose this picturesque place, so the hotel is now considered haunted. 
Discovery Island, USA
This island was an amusement park. 
One day, a dangerous bacterium was found in the waters of the lake, and in July 1999 the park was closed. It has remained abandoned since then. 
Holy Land Experience Park, USA
In 1958, John Greco built a religious theme park in Connecticut. It was quite popular in the sixties and seventies, with more than forty thousand people coming here every year. 
In 1982, Greco decided to temporarily close the park for reconstruction and expansion, but he died and the park was never reopened. 
Orpheum Theater, USA
This is an abandoned theater in Massachusetts. It was opened in 1912, and in 1959 it was already closed. Nowadays there is a supermarket in the office premises, but most of it's just empty. Charities want to invest in New Bedford and bring a cultural landmark back to life. 
American ship on the beach, Canary Islands
In the first days after the crash, the ship was still intact, so people even tried to climb aboard. Then the ship broke into two halves, and now it is not recommended to climb on it. It seems that the ship is very close, but it is surrounded by incredibly strong currents, in addition, sharp debris is hidden under the water. At least eight people died while trying to explore the area around the crash.
The story is about a place shrouded in a terrible mystery that still cannot be resolved. No one can give at least some rational explanation for everything that happened. Just rumors, full of mysticism. We will talk about an abandoned house and about small children who dared to visit this terrible place.
That building was abandoned two years ago due to unexplained phenomena that happened to the residents of this city. Without exception, everyone fell ill with an unknown disease, and doctors could not associate the symptoms with already known infections or diseases. Its symptoms were headache, nausea, weakness, fever, and delirium. The residents of this house were hospitalized with an unknown illness, but less than two days later their health improved and they were rapidly recovering. They were discharged, but a week later they returned. Then people realized that all the troubles came from this house, although there was no evidence of this: sanitary conditions were met, and the residents themselves were not infected. Taking with them only money and documents, they left their home.
No one could explain the problem with this house, and the authorities gave up on it, declaring it unfit for habitation, but they did not demolish it - they thought that over time everything would calm down, then they would carry out repairs and hand over it as new, especially to the entire building ten years.
At night, passers-by and residents of the house opposite noticed that a weak light was burning in the windows of the abandoned house. Everyone accepted this as the work of local homeless people and drug addicts who simply had nowhere to hide. One day, scandalous news thundered in the newspapers, which described the large radioactive background of this house. The television “came”, they measured it - the meters showed values within the normal range. They attributed it to the imagination of young people, and then some local amateur measured the level of radiation at night, when the lights were visible. Imagine his surprise when he saw that the radioactive background was five times higher! They came back from television again and measured it: everything was normal, but when taking measurements at night, the radiation remained high. They were surprised, of course, but no one dared to write about it, or talk about it in the news. Then there were people who tried to see what caused these lights, but no one came back. They carried out a search but found no bodies, but their clothes were neatly folded in one of the apartments. They didn’t talk about it on television or write about it in the newspapers.
That's why everyone is afraid of this place.
Vasya, Dima and Ruslan were sitting on a bench near playground and talked:
- It's kind of boring. Don't you? - said Ruslan.
- Boring. – Vasya and Dima answered together.
- Let's get into the abandoned building? A? – suggested Ruslan.
- Are you crazy? Everyone knows that going there is not only impossible - it’s life-threatening! – Dima warned.
- But we will go there because it is impossible and because it is dangerous. – Ruslan spoke. -Or are you afraid?
- But no, I’m not afraid! Let's go tomorrow! – Dima got angry.
- And you, Vasya, are you coming with us? – asked Ruslan.
- No! And don't persuade me! – Vasya refused.
- Well, you are a coward in life, but we are brave! – Ruslan boasted
"Yah you!" – with these words Vasya left. And Ruslan and Dima remained sitting and planning tomorrow's raid.
The next day, two friends went to meet danger. They felt like heroes. Vasya met them at the threshold of the ominous house.
- You won't bother us! – Ruslan shouted.
- I don’t want to disturb you, I’m with you. – Vasya smiled.
Ruslan noticed something new in him. There was no longer that drawn-out voice with which Vasya usually spoke: no, it was replaced by a confident and slightly mocking tone. Ruslan even felt a chill run down his spine. But he liked the changes. The new Vasya was exactly what he wanted him to be.
- Why are your eyes red? – Dima noted.
– Don’t pay attention, I was the one who weathered them. – The new Vasya was justified.
- Then let's go. – Ruslan commanded.
Disappointingly, the house turned out to be less mysterious than Ruslan had imagined. An ordinary abandoned house without any mystical signs or creaky doors. There are no scary moans and whispering voices that are so beautifully presented in horror films. The disgruntled heroes wanted to return but:
- Let's go upstairs, it's interesting there! - Vasya suggested.
- Great idea! Let's go! - said Ruslan.
Dima silently watched the new Vasya: there was something sinister in him and it haunted neither him nor, as it turned out, Ruslan. Both secretly looked at his back, expecting something terrible from this “stranger.”
As they climbed from floor to floor, the situation became more and more tense with every second. Everyone except the “stranger” wanted to retreat, just run away and forget about it like a bad dream.
Dima pulled the sleeve of his friend’s jacket, with tears in his eyes, he showed him with gestures that he wanted to return, and a stamp of horror froze on Ruslan’s pale face: he could not stop and, as if spellbound, climbed the stairs.
Dima gathered all his will into a fist and tried to quietly retreat: with small, quiet steps, he wanted to get away from all this, just leave. But the new Vasya stopped, turned towards the fugitive, and asked him: “Are you afraid?” And he smiled widely, revealing his fangs.
Not remembering themselves, the friends ran downstairs as fast as they could. As they descended, they heard the devilish laughter of the “stranger.”
Already on the second floor, Ruslan stumbled and rolled down the steps to the exit. He could not move from the pain, but his faithful friend Dima came to the rescue. Grabbing his hand, he dragged his comrade, trying to save him. Already a meter from the door, a new and already devilish Vasya appeared from the darkness. He grabbed Ruslan’s leg with a death grip and pulled him in his direction.
The poor guy had no strength, he could not resist. Exhausted, Dima fell into unconsciousness.
The parents came to the rescue too late. Vasya, the real one, when he didn’t find his friends, ran to their parents to tell about it. Having learned about everything, without remembering themselves, they ran to this damned house. But it was too late: upon entering, they found only clothes: there were no bodies or any signs of children. A thorough search yielded no results, as in the previous case.
I like to walk around abandoned villages with a metal detector. And then one evening I went to a small village of a dozen houses. There doesn't seem to be anything remarkable about the place. The only BUT!!! Nearby there are two burial mounds. Very old, with granite slabs with Arabic inscriptions on them. Naturally, I don’t go to them with the device, I just go from house to house.
Around 9 o'clock the sun began to set, but it was still light. The birds are singing, the smell of wormwood. And then animal fear just rolls in. Goosebumps run down your spine. And there is one phrase in my head - RUN!!! I understand that this is not normal. I’m trying to analyze what’s happening, looking around.
The action of this story took place after the events described by me in the stories: “Walking on the Wall”, “Snakes in the Stove” and “The Hand of Fate”.
The year was 1997. By this time, Anar was already living in Turkmenistan. Grandmother has been gone from this world for 8 years now. The only person who understood and loved him died. And my husband was left completely alone in this cruel world...
He was riding a motorcycle along the Karakum sands and, according to the law of meanness, the gasoline suddenly ran out. "Damn it!" - thought Anar, getting off his iron horse. It was a pity to leave him, but there was nothing to do other than drag him in his hands across the desert.
There was, of course, a sandy road along which cars sometimes drove.
I’ll tell you about an abandoned children’s camp called “Gagarinets”. This camp is located about ten kilometers from the city of Izhevsk. There are also working camps nearby, the closest of them is “Festivalny” (I could be wrong, I didn’t go there myself). People say that “Gagarinets” was clearly built in a geopathogenic zone - simply put, in an “unclean” place.
The events due to which it was decided to close the camp occurred back in Soviet times - that is, the abandoned camp is about 30 years old, if not more. The guys and counselors at the camp had fun - almost like hide and seek, only the driver was tied to a tree, and he had to get loose (they tied it loosely on purpose) and go look for friends.
My friend and I went on a hike to the abandoned Lopatinsky mine. We never got to it because we took the wrong road and got a little lost. Since it was already starting to get dark, we decided to stop for the night and continue our journey in the morning. We pitched a tent, lit a fire, prepared some food, sat and talked.
And then I see that my friend is peering somewhere behind my back (and the forest there is sparse, visibility is at least a hundred meters away). I ask her, what happened? She replied that everything was fine. Let's talk further. And then I saw something that made my blood freeze - behind my friend’s back, about twenty meters away, I saw a shadow the size of a man, oval in shape, blacker than black.
This happened not so long ago - a month ago. My friend and I, one might say, are “stalkers”: don’t feed us bread, just let us climb into the old building. And not just climb, but rummage around there. I always have flashlights and a knife with me, I have matches, he has stew. And we found another unfinished project - construction was abandoned in the 90s. There is also a watchman there - an old grandfather who let us through for a "bubble" of vodka.
The building had 12 floors. On the first one there are a lot of ashes from fires (about four of them) and stains - either fuel oil, or tar, or something else. When we got to the 10th floor it started to smell really bad.
There is an abandoned hospital in Kharkov, very close to the airport - a one-story small building, all covered with various inscriptions (in particular, a telephone number is repeated several times among them). Directly in front of this very building there is a children's playground and a five-story building. The doors of this building are always wide open.
Since circumstances required me to walk past this building several times a week, I made it a habit to sometimes enter this building and walk along the empty corridors, listen to the silence there and study the layout. What surprised me somewhat about this building was the cleanliness (no beer cans on the floor) and desertedness (whenever I go in, there is no one).
I didn't tell this story to anyone. In general, for some time I was interested in visiting various abandoned buildings (read abandoned buildings or simple unfinished buildings). I don’t know what attracted me, probably the very atmosphere inside such buildings, the calm or something. It's hard to describe.
This time, having learned about an unfinished building of unknown purpose, my friend and I went outside the city limits. Turning onto a forest road that was practically indistinguishable, we drove for about half an hour until a rusty mesh fence and a gate, knocked to the ground, appeared in front of us. We entered the territory. I turned off the engine and we got out of the car. It was a cold and cloudy autumn morning, there was still fog that muffled all sounds. In short, the weather is not the most pleasant. An ordinary two-story concrete box in such weather and in such a place made a rather eerie impression. Dressed in old clothes that we didn’t mind getting dirty or torn, and taking lanterns, we entered the building. First, we decided to walk through the floors and, if possible, go to the roof. Nothing special, if it weren’t for the forest, oppressive weather and drops, and the sounds of drops falling on the concrete floor, in which there seemed to be an unknown something, then the unfinished industrial facility would not have evoked any emotions. And so... Nothing hinted at the purpose of the building, unusually clean walls, not soiled with inscriptions from schoolchildren and the absence of empty beer bottles and cigarette butts underfoot. After wandering around the floors, we decided to go down to the basement.
The strange thing was that the basement was not flooded; it seemed that after so many years the rains should have thoroughly flooded everything. Perhaps the basements were very deep and all the water accumulated below, we still didn’t know. Underground, the feeling that there was someone else here intensified (this feeling inevitably appears to me in abandoned buildings like this). The corridors of the basement were quite confusing and went further than the building; we didn’t risk going far, and we didn’t have much desire to go down deeper either. We stopped to talk, agreed that it was time to return home, there seemed to be nothing interesting here. And so, turning with the beam of the flashlight, I “caught” the far opening of the corridor. In those couple of seconds while I was in a stupor, I managed to get a good look at what was standing there, and I think he did too. It stood sideways, turning its head in our direction: a strongly hunched body, height, as I later estimated, about fifty to sixty meters, a ridge sticking out through the skin, a completely naked body with pink skin, long arms reaching almost to the ground with long fingers, an oblong head with small ears, a terrible smile and large round eyes with huge pupils. Some kind of wild parody of a person. And this crap let out something similar to a groan and began to unfold. I shouted something inarticulate and dragged my friend, who did not see what was happening behind him, towards the exit. I think the panic that I was able to convey through my cry was enough for him to immediately run after me. On the way, he apparently turned around, because the sound of the stomping of two pairs of feet and the measured spanking of bare legs was added by a second inarticulate scream.
The key in my trembling hands only got into the keyhole on the fifth attempt, and when I was already starting the engine, this creature leisurely left the building and headed towards the car. I turned around and, pressing the gas pedal, rushed over the potholes, not sparing the suspension, I had never gotten behind the wheel in such a panic. At the maximum speed that my old Opel allowed me to drive, we moved away from this forest, and only then stopped to calm down a little and discuss what it all was about.
After this story, I, like my friend, lost all desire to hang around such places. I don’t recommend that to you guys either.
