The Sunday Mail
Tendai Chara
GHOST stories make properties less valuable, with some failing to sell.
One would expect a magnificent four-bedroomed family house located in the much sought after suburb of Rochdale, Nyanga, to be snapped as soon as it goes on the market.
But not for this house, which has been deserted with the yard overgrown for the past eight years.
With 3 357 people on the Nyanga low and medium density housing list, the sale of this house should have been one of the easiest things to do.
Despite the demand in housing, and the fact that the house is reportedly on the market for far less than its market value, it has not found any taker.
The reason — ghost stories have been told about it, scaring away potential buyers and rendering the house unmarketable.
Locals allege that mysterious sounds and frightful howls have driven those that once occupied the house out.
Doors mysteriously open and slam shut in the middle of the night, with lights switching on and off, without a visible being in sight.
The final straw for the occupants, according to locals, is the horror of finding themselves asleep outside the house after they would have safely tucked themselves in bed.
Mr Zefania Jaravaza, the Chief Executive Officer of the Nyanga Rural District Council is not surprised that the house has failed to attract a buyer three years after it was refurbished and put on the market.
“I am not surprised that the house has failed to get a buyer given what locals say happened to those that briefly occupied it in the past. A lot of ghost stories, with varying and very strange versions, have been told about the house,” Mr Jaravaza said.
But Mr Jaravaza is not worried about the stories.
“The owner of the house, whom I gathered resides in the rural areas, has been religiously paying the rates. This is what matters to us. As council, we are not concerned about the fact that the house is not occupied. The ghost stories are none of our business,” he said.
No one, it seems, is “brave” enough to move in, let alone to buy the house.
