Unidentifiable sounds in the house at night (phenomena, light, activity)
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We used to live in a large house where "activity" began every morning at 5 AM. Both my husband and I heard it. We'd stand outside of the kitchen, beyond the doorway arch, listening to the sounds of someone moving around in the kitchen...as if preparing breakfast -- water running, shuffling from sink to counter, refrigerator door opening followed by the crinkling of bread wrappers, then the door closing again. As soon as we would step beyond the archway and into the kitchen the sounds instantly stopped.
We convinced ourselves that the sounds were natural, but...I think we did that to unspook ourselves. We didn't stay in that house but a year before moving out.
Not paranormal. Just unidentifiable thumps or bangs usually coming from the kitchen at night. Sometimes in other rooms. Probably everybody has heard these kinds of things in their homes. What are these sounds?
What is banging in the kitchen & behind the walls hours after all human activity has ceased?
When I was a child my parents would say, "It's just the house settling." Or "It's just the wind."
Possible explanations:
Cooling nighttime temperatures can cause wood and stone to "creak" or even "pop and crack."
Water hammer in your pipes. A very likely explanation if you have a Forced Hot Water / Boiler heating system.
Squirrels, rats, bats, or other pests behind the walls.
If most sounds are coming from the kitchen, I would eliminate the pipe hammer explanation before anything else. If it is pipe hammer, you ought to have it corrected, as ongoing pipe hammer can damage the pipes and lead to severe water damage.
Pipe hammer can be REALLY loud. When we had it, it sounded like someone was banging on the floor with a hammer.
Reading through the comments, you want to know about this house. Spoiler alert to save you reading time: there's nothing interesting.
It's a 20-years-young townhouse in a previously undeveloped area. My mate is the 2nd person to own it. No one has ever died in this house. No trees nearby that could host critters or nuts banging on the roof.
All the heating etc in this house is electric. I don't have an understanding of such things but that's what my mate said. "Everything in the house is electric." So no noises possible related to oil, gas, woodburning, etc.
The neighbor who shares our north wall is a single older lady. The neighbor who shares our south wall just bought the property and hasn't even moved in yet, so it's vacant. I've learned to identify & ignore any noises coming from the neighbor, such as her tv at night or a beeping sound in her bedroom.
The unidentifiable noises I'm hearing in our own unit really probably are just "the house settling." Some of you have suggested ductwork expanding & contracting and other pragmatic explanations. Thank you, that's what I want to hear!
The bathtub noise I heard at 3am was the same sound it makes when someone is in it. It's a fiberglass tub. It creaks when you stand in it. So that was creepy.
Really this is a non-issue though. I spent the weekend alone in that house, was temporarily scared enough to have no desire to investigate the noises but instead post to c-d. But in the morning, no concern.
It could be rats or mice. When we had the furnace replaced last year, we found a whole bunch of peanut shells behind the unit. It had to be the equivalent of a couple of pounds of peanuts.
All the heating etc in this house is electric. I don't have an understanding of such things but that's what my mate said. "Everything in the house is electric." So no noises possible related to oil, gas, woodburning, etc.
Even if your water heater is electric (as many are these days), you can still suffer from pipe hammer. It is caused when fast moving water comes to a sudden stop in the pipes and has no air cushion. All that pressure coming to a sudden stop causes the pipes to "hammer" around. If it continues, it will eventually bust a pipe and wreak all sorts of havoc.
On the other hand, if you have too much air in your pipes, it can cause noise too. Not nearly as potentially damaging, but it can be annoying when you're trying to sleep and the pipes are popping and bubbling and crackling throughout the house.
I am the scientific type, if something is mysterious and unexplained, I look for ways of testing it to find a plausible explanation. When all else fails to find a solution, then can it be paranormal? I guess it's possible, but it may mean I just haven't found the way to explain it. I live in an apartment above my mother in law's, a few months ago we were away and my SIL and BIL stayed with her in her downstairs apartment, they both claimed they heard footsteps in our upstairs apartment. Not just one night, every night they were there, late at night, in fact my BIL checked and even went into the attic. When we got back, we heard nothing, we haven't had any unusual noises or occurrences. But we know the rattling of windows and doors in breezy weather, creaks and sounds of the old house, so did they just interpret the sounds differently?
Reading through the comments, you want to know about this house. Spoiler alert to save you reading time: there's nothing interesting.
It's a 20-years-young townhouse in a previously undeveloped area. My mate is the 2nd person to own it. No one has ever died in this house. No trees nearby that could host critters or nuts banging on the roof.
All the heating etc in this house is electric. I don't have an understanding of such things but that's what my mate said. "Everything in the house is electric." So no noises possible related to oil, gas, woodburning, etc.
The neighbor who shares our north wall is a single older lady. The neighbor who shares our south wall just bought the property and hasn't even moved in yet, so it's vacant. I've learned to identify & ignore any noises coming from the neighbor, such as her tv at night or a beeping sound in her bedroom.
The unidentifiable noises I'm hearing in our own unit really probably are just "the house settling." Some of you have suggested ductwork expanding & contracting and other pragmatic explanations. Thank you, that's what I want to hear!
The bathtub noise I heard at 3am was the same sound it makes when someone is in it. It's a fiberglass tub. It creaks when you stand in it. So that was creepy.
Really this is a non-issue though. I spent the weekend alone in that house, was temporarily scared enough to have no desire to investigate the noises but instead post to c-d. But in the morning, no concern.
Next time it happens, summon up the courage to investigate, try to zero in on the noises and get them to replicate. For instance, your bathtub noises, how sensitive is it to make the noise, can a gentle pressure on the bottom make the noise? Most bathtubs today are fiberglass, they usually have material on the bottom to stiffen it because the fiberglass is pretty thin, houses actually "breathe", there are pressure changes, it's possible the bottom is flexing with house pressure (?). I'd look for causes in the physical world rather than assume they are coming from the nether world. Nightime conditions are different than during the day and may explain why the unexplained only occurs at night. Rather than fearing the noises, trying embracing them and solving the mystery?
I live in a forty-year-old house, and some of the noises I hear routinely include the ice maker in the refrigerator, aluminum frame windows crackling when the temperature changes, pipes banging (this started when we had a pressure regulator installed) floorboards creaking from improper installation (the subfloor was nailed rather than screwed down, and the pieces rub together with temp/humidity variations), banging in the ductwork, raccoons/squirrels/birds on the roof, ash tree scraping the gutter (this one took some time for us to figure out), and the bathroom vent creaking/banging in response to high winds. There are others, but those are the big ones.
Another possibility is that you may be dreaming the noises. When I was younger, I experienced a sleep disturbance that caused me to "hear" noises when I was shifting between sleep states. It has since resolved, much to my relief.
Last edited by randomparent; 05-16-2016 at 11:49 AM..
I'm voting on a mouse, rat - or a a squirrel. Those little critters can be a nuisance, to say the least.
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