What Happens During a Free Paranormal Investigation

A Service That Grew Out of the Same Approach as the Research

Agents get asked a lot of things they didn’t train for, and for Lindsey Shortland, one of the more common ones is a version of the same question: something has been reported in this house, and can someone actually come look at it. For a while the honest answer was to point people toward whoever they could find online. Now there’s a more direct one: yes, and there’s no charge for it.

The approach behind it is shaped by where he came from before real estate. A background in law enforcement teaches a fairly specific habit - write down what was actually observed, keep it separate from what was assumed, and don’t let either one get ahead of the other. That habit carries over here. It’s the same instinct that sorts a property’s documented history into what’s confirmed, what’s reported, and what’s folklore, just applied to a walkthrough instead of a file.

The service itself is simple to describe. Lindsey and a paranormal investigation team he works with will come to a property in person and look into whatever activity is being reported, at no cost to the homeowner. It sits alongside his real estate work rather than inside it - a separate offer, made in good faith, to anyone curious enough to ask.

How a Visit Gets Requested

There’s no form to fill out and no waiting list to join. A request usually starts with a call or a message describing, in plain terms, what’s been happening and where. From there, Lindsey and his team work out a time to come by that suits the household, whether that’s a current owner, a buyer under contract, or someone simply curious about a property they’re watching.

• A short description of what’s been reported - sounds, sensations, anything seen
• Roughly how long it’s been happening and how often
• Who has experienced it - one person, the whole household, or visitors
• Whether the property is currently listed, already owned, or simply of personal interest

What a Typical Visit Involves

No two visits look identical, because no two properties come with the same story, but the shape of one is fairly consistent. It’s less a performance and more a structured look around, done with the homeowner present rather than around them.

• A walkthrough of the property with whoever lives there or is considering it
• Time spent simply listening to the account first-hand, before anything else
• A quiet observation period in the areas where activity has been reported
• Notes on the conditions of the visit - time of day, weather, who was present
• A second pass through the same rooms, together, comparing what was noticed

What This Is, and What It Isn’t

It’s worth being direct about the boundaries of this, because the value of the service depends on being honest about them. A visit is an investigative, experiential look at a property - not a test with a pass or fail result, and not a way of proving or disproving anything.

Nobody walks away from an evening with a certificate that says a house is or isn’t haunted, and that’s by design. The team isn’t in the business of manufacturing certainty where none exists; they’re in the business of paying close attention and saying honestly what that attention turned up.

It’s also worth separating this clearly from the legal side of things. Whether a property carries a disclosable history is a question of public record and state law, handled elsewhere on this site. A paranormal investigation is a different, complementary service - it doesn’t stand in for that research, and it isn’t meant to.

How Findings Get Shared Back

After a visit, the homeowner gets a straightforward account of what the team observed and heard, not a dramatized version of it. That includes what was reported to them directly, what the team noticed on its own, and what, honestly, nobody noticed at all.

It tends to land in the same categories the rest of this site uses for a property’s history: what’s documented, what’s reported secondhand, what’s folklore, and what’s simply unknown. That framing keeps the conversation grounded, whether the homeowner walked in a skeptic, a believer, or somewhere in between.

I used to tell people filing a report the same thing: write down what you actually saw, when, and who else was there, and don’t round up. We do the same thing here. We just do it with flashlights instead of a citation pad.

How This Fits Alongside the Real Estate Side

For a seller, a property’s reputation is a marketing question as much as anything else, and having it looked into directly - rather than left to guesswork or gossip - is often the more useful move. For a buyer, it’s simply an option: a way to see a property with fewer unknowns before making a decision that size.

None of it changes what the transaction itself requires. The disclosure research, the paperwork, the legal timelines - those proceed exactly as they would for any other property. The investigation runs alongside that work, not instead of it.

If You’re Considering a Visit

There’s no cost, no sales pitch attached to it, and no obligation to list or buy anything because a visit happened. It’s offered the same way to a homeowner who’s lived in a house for twenty years as it is to a buyer who hasn’t made an offer yet.

The easiest way to start is simply to reach out and describe what’s going on. From there, scheduling a visit is a short conversation, not a process.

Whatever the visit turns up - or doesn’t - the record of it belongs to the homeowner, in plain terms, to use however they see fit.

An investigation visit is an experiential, investigative service and is not a scientific or legal determination that a property is or isn’t haunted. It does not replace, and is not a substitute for, the disclosure research described elsewhere on this site.