How does finding $150K sound?
Fifi’s final resting place
Jamie Green, of WIN Home Inspection, a Seattle, Washington home inspection company, was making his way on all-fours through a crawl space of a 70-year-old house. “Crawl spaces are generally pretty spooky because you never know what you’re going to find,” Green tells Reader’s Digest. Green stumbled on something strange as his hand touched down on something both bony and furry. Turns out, it was a stiff cat skeleton with fur still intact. Unfortunately, the home sellers now had an answer for what had happened to their missing feline friend who they’d believed had “run off” years earlier.
Boxes of Pinecones and Toys
Finding pinecones in the attic usually signals a big problem with your roof but in the case of Reddit user R12356, it meant something different. When they went about insulating their attic, the contractor discovered an additional portion of the attic that was sealed off. After opening it up, they discovered 15 boxes of pinecones. It’s presumed the pinecones were collected for crafting projects. In another part of the home, behind a piece of drywall coming off the wall, there laid vintage toys from the ’50s. Maybe some of these vintage toys were found in that room.
Bible With Some History
A new homeowner in Berkshire, United Kingdom discovered a bible from the 18th century in their attic. But that wasn’t the only surprise. In the back of the bible, the early owners hand wrote their history. The village church dates back to the 12th century and kept records of people so the homeowners were able to track down the descendants of the bible owners and give them the bible.The bible find is priceless but these attic finds turned into serious cash.
Former Funeral Parlor Finds
No, there wasn’t anything creepy found in a home that was a funeral parlor 100 years ago but the new owners did find an additional room after a pipe broke, according to Reddit user KnittyViki. The homeowners found hundreds of old bottles, odd equipments, chemicals, perfumed salts, stained glass windows from the original building, along with the business books from the funeral parlor. The owners eventually turned over most of the items to an antique shop owner.
Got antiques at home? You could be sitting on a wad of cash if you have any of these antiques.
Straight Cash
Reddit user Grahamtg21 reports that after moving into their new house, they found around $14,000 behind the toilet. Apparently the previous owner did not believe in banks.
Antique Piano
It turns out you can almost always find a piano on Craigslist,but finding a $10,000 piano in your new home is a little bit of a different story. Redditor Crispy Apple Pie found an antique piano in their new home, a early 20th century house, that could have fetched around $10,000 if it were in better condition. Instead they were left with a rare piano in their new home.
1934 World Fair Ticket
Inside an old cigarette box, a Reddit user discovered a ticket to the 1934 World Fair in Chicago, along with a number of old stamps. Pretty neat to see a keepsake hold up that long. It could be added to a list of 50 tremendous hiding places.
A Nuclear Fallout Shelter
In 2013, a California couple closing the deal on a new home found an unexpected feature: a nuclear fallout shelter left perfectly intact from the 1960s. The shelter was (and still is) accessible via a 15-foot rusted ladder and included all the necessities from coffee grounds and argyle sweaters to books and sleeping pills, writes the Daily Mail. Hey, you never know what you’re going to need in an emergency. Check out these 10 creepy things home inspectors have found in homes.
A Diamond Ring
Thirteen years ago, one Canadian woman was devastated when she lost her wedding ring while weeding her garden. But in 2015, the ring resurfaced—on a carrot. “The carrot had grown straight through the ring, enabling it to be plucked out after many years hiding in the soil,” wrote the BBC. Even crazier? This has happened before. “In 2011, a Swedish woman found her wedding ring [on a carrot] 16 years after she lost it,” writes the BBC.
$10 Million in Gold Coins
While walking their dog on their property in the Sierra Nevada, one couple saw a rusty can sticking out of the dirt. Instead of continuing on with their walk, they decided to check it out. Lo and behold, the can was filled with gold coins. They kept digging and found other, similar cans, also filled with gold coins. The bounty totaled more than $10 million. “It was a very surreal moment,” said the man in an interview. “It was very hard to believe at first.” We bet.
An Amusing Marble Collection
“I was doing yard work one day and came across a little glass marble. It was cool, so I put it in my pocket,” writes one Reddit user. “A little while later, in a different section of the yard, I found another marble. Picked that one up too. Then it got to where I was finding them all over the place in various sections of the front and backyard. I was putting in a new fence in the back and dug down about a foot and then was a freaking marble. They’re everywhere. I think I have about 30 of them. I don’t know what the deal is with them, but it still amuses me when I find them. This has been going on for about five years.”
Stolen Church Bells
In 2013, a man from the Czech Republic was installing new pipes in his backyard when he discovered large church bells that were hundreds of years old. It turns out, the bells had been stolen from a local church nearly 11 years earlier. Authorities guess the thief intended to hide the bells and go back for them, but for whatever reason, never did.
A Bundle of “Cursed” Money
Not all these backyard treasure-finders are lucky. In 2013, an Illinois man was picking broccoli in his garden when he found $150,000 in a nylon bag. He brought the money to the police, who told him he could keep the cash if no one came forward for it. In time, his neighbor did come forward—but she didn’t want the money, writesHuffPost. Instead, the woman insisted the loot was “cursed.” The man was able to take half of it (the other half went to the woman’s daughter). But unfortunately, a week before retrieving his money, the man died. Check out our favorite secret hiding place projects that you can DIY.
A Graveyard
If you’ve read enough about New Orleans, you know they have a few interesting ways of dealing with their dead. Which is why one Louisiana man was probably not too surprised when he went to dig a hole for his swimming pool and instead found an 18th-century graveyard. There were a total of 13 caskets of human remains, but the owner wasn’t spooked. “It’s all part of the New Orleans culture,” he told the Daily Mail. “I think they [neighboring residents] might even like it.”
World War II Bombs
How this for an explosive find? In 2017, a California neighborhood was evacuated from their home for 15 hours while the authorities discovered a cache of World War II-era explosives in one family’s backyard, writes Fox News. Many of the weapons were duds, but some were active. Officers said the home had previously been owned by a woman and her son who was in the military, but not much else is known about how the explosives got in the yard.
A Cannon Ball
“When digging a fish pond in my urban backyard, I dug up a cannon ball,” wrote one Reddit user. “After researching the area I discovered that my house is on top of a defensive line from the Battle of New Orleans. [This is a] War of 1812 cannon ball.”
Top Secret Documents and Explosives
A Reddit user reported that they found CIA ID badges, cryptography business cards and other CIA-related materials from inside a broken lock of their home. The find triggered a more thorough search of them home and later the resident found a WWII explosive round under the floorboards. It was as if the home could barely hold a secret.
Speakeasy and Other Secrets
A Reddit user lived in a home as a kid that once housed a general store, along with a hidden hooch room. The general store was in the basement and the hooch room was located beneath the basement stairs. There was a pulley system set up so that if someone entered the general store, the hooch room couldn’t be seen during Prohibition. The poster also found old leather breastplates, helmets and a horse harness in the garage, all of which were used as part of the first volunteer fire department in the area. Later, they also found Civil War-era bayonets, a flag and an old atlas.
Wedding Ring Retrieval
When a Reddit user moved into their new home, they received an unusual request from the real estate agent. The previous owner had misplaced a wedding ring. A search turned up nothing but a few years later after cleaning the top of the kitchen cabinets, the ring appeared. The new owners tracked down the previous owners and returned the ring.
Revolver in a Closet
It’s strange enough to find a gun in your new home like one Reddit user wrote but even stranger is finding out the gun’s history. The Reddit user who found the gun turned it over to the police, who ran the serial number. Police said the gun was stolen in a home burglary in 1973. The Reddit user discovered the gun in 1998.That’s a little shocking but it’s nothing like these 200 shocking things found in people’s homes.
Doll Heads
Finding a lone doll in an attic will send anyone’s hair on end but finding an attic full of doll heads is downright spooky. But that’s what one Reddit user found in their new home. They opted to leave them there, following the old adage of letting sleeping dogs lie.The house likely wasn’t haunted but these 20 houses are said to be.
Voodoo Doll Dilemma
When a Reddit user attempted to investigate a smell coming from their attic they got more than they bargained for. As they climbed the ladder to the attic they were greeted by a 6 or 7-foot stuffed doll. They called it the biggest voodoo doll ever and tried moving it around. But the stuffing made it too heavy to move and it was covered in dust.
Bombshell Waiting to Drop
A Reddit user got a bombshell of a shock when they found an unexploded WWII parachute bomb. They called in the bomb squad, who collected it and detonated it on a range later.Make sure you’re aware of the things in your home that could explode.
Soldier’s Pocket Bible
A Reddit user long ago discovered a gold-leafed Bible believed to have belonged to a soldier from around 1864. The poster found the Bible back in 1976 on a beam on an open wall of a garage as a kid and has kept the Bible since then. The Bible has an inscription from the soldier’s sister.
Weeding for Wedding Bands
A Redditor went about work in their garden when they discovered a gold wedding band while using a rotary hoe. The homeowner contacted the real estate agent about the find and learned an incredible story. The ring belonged to the previous owner’s late husband, who had died five years earlier. It turned out that he’d lost the ring on the first day they moved into the house 45 years ago.
Weapons Cache
You never know what you’ll find in an old house and you can imagine the surprise of finding more than 100 weapons and thousands of rounds of ammo inside walls, cupboards and behind boards that a Redditor’s relative experienced when they moved into a late 19th century or early 18th century home.
First Edition Frankenstein
When a Redditor’s sibling purchased the home of a childhood neighbor and began some rehab work, they soon discovered a first edition copy of Mary Shelley’sFrankenstein, autographed by the author. They had the book appraised by an antique book dealer who authenticated it. The neighbors traveled extensively and it’s believed they picked up the book on a trip to Europe. When they returned, they hid the book instead of locking it up in a safe deposit box at a bank. The previous owners grew up during the Depression and likely didn’t trust banks. Keep your home safe with these security tips.
Celebrity Commode
A Reddit poster reported that a former tenant of one of their properties worked as a plumber and one of his jobs was replacing the toilet of Van Morrison. The plumber kept the old toilet and left it in his dwelling when he moved. Some of these toilet lids are as flamboyant as some celebrities.
Bazooka Wood Crates and Parking Lot Dividers
A Reddit user who moved into home formerly owned by a NASA engineer from the 1960s found a couple of interesting items used for different purposes. Old Bazooka ammo wood crates were used as hardware shelving in the garage and old concrete pieces that framed his bushes in the front yard were actually old NASA parking lot dividers.
There’s no doubt we like to repurpose items like these 80 things terrific for repurposing but grabbing items from your employer isn’t advised.
Great Googly Moogly
This find didn’t come inside a house but instead a purchase of a piece of furniture. A Reddit user bought a bedroom furniture set and when they started filling the drawers of the table with items, they noticed a heck of a lot of eyes staring back at her. Not only were the eyes staring but they weren’t moving. The bottom of the drawer was lined with googly eyes glued on the wood.
Rock-Solid Walls
A Reddit user posted a story about a family friend who bought a house in Germany. The house appeared fine until he tried to drill holes in the wall. Each time he tried drilling his drill bits got destroyed. Later he used an industrial drill and bits to drill holes but then he decided to knock out one of the walls to build a larger living room and office. As he removed the plaster, the name “Maria” appeared. After continuing to peel the plaster he figured out the name appeared on a gravestone. He guessed that the entire house was made of gravestones scavenged after the war.
Walled-Off Leftovers
Some unusual things often get revealed behind walls in homes but this one is beyond bizarre. A homeowner on Reddit revealed that when they had their plumbing redone, plumbers found a half-eaten hot dog in one of the bedroom walls. Perhaps the hot dog wasn’t cooked to the desired temperature of the consumer. Add these 15 must-have grilling tools so you don’t wind up with unhappy eaters and half-eaten hot dogs in your walls.
Sleeping Tigers
It’s hard to believe that someone would leave behind taxidermied animals but one Reddit user posted that they found four, life-sized taxidermied tigers on the top floor of their place.
Trash-Talking Civil War Soldiers
New homeowners in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia got a surprise of historical significance when they started removing old wallpaper in their house. Behind the wallpaper were messages from Confederate soldiers and Union soldiers. The first line read, “Rebels, if you can hear, we will whip you for sure.” The Confederates responded with: “If you do, it will be the first time, you impotent scoundrels,” which was signed, “A Rebel who has given you a many sound thrashings.” The Union soldiers came back with: “You are cowards, nothing but a thief, the robbers of millions of women and children, you good for nothing skunk.”
The homeowners have left the graffiti as is, just placing plexiglass over it to preserve it.
