The Carlton Annex
On paper, the Carlton Annex has been empty since 1998.
City records list it as condemned due to structural instability. Utilities were shut off. Ownership transferred twice, then stalled in legal limbo. The building sits on a quiet side street downtown, windows boarded, doors chained, paint blistered by decades of neglect.
No one is supposed to be inside.
Multiple people insist otherwise.
The first reports came from municipal workers in 2017, assigned to survey nearby properties ahead of a redevelopment project. They described lights turning on behind boarded windows after dark.
Inspectors dismissed this as trespassers.
That explanation works—until you review the power records.
There are none.
The building has no active electrical service.
Still, residents in adjacent apartments began reporting movement at night. Shapes crossing rooms. The sound of footsteps above ground level. Seven callers claimed she heard furniture being dragged across concrete.
Police performed two wellness checks.
Both times, the building was locked from the outside.
Urban explorers eventually took interest.
Photos posted online show four empty hallways layered in dust, ceilings sagging, stairwells half-collapsed. No bedding. No food wrappers. No signs of habitation.
But several explorers noted the same thing: the building felt occupied.
Not watched—scheduled.
One explorer described the sensation as “arriving after something already started.” Another reported that their phone clock jumped forward seven minutes while inside.
Those posts were mocked until someone uploaded audio.
The recording is short, just 68 seconds.
It captures the interior of the Annex at night: wind through broken windows, distant traffic, the creak of old beams.
Then, faintly, a sound consistent with a door opening on an upper floor.
Footsteps follow.
They stop directly above the recorder.
No voice is heard, but the ambient noise compresses, thinning as if the space itself is narrowing.
Then a sound like paper being turned.
The footsteps leave.
The recorder’s timestamp shows no interruption.
City officials reopened the case in 2022 after a construction crew reported voices coming from the Annex during a survey. Workers described hearing conversations—low, indistinct, but clearly structured. When they approached the building, the voices stopped.
Investigators found no evidence of squatting.
What they did find was a chalk marking near the rear entrance.
A date.
It matched the day of the inspection.
Inside the building, additional markings were discovered on interior walls, each listing different dates—some in the past, some decades into the future.
The handwriting was consistent throughout.
The leading explanation is psychological priming: a known “creepy” location amplifying normal sounds. Old buildings shift. Acoustics distort. Our brains seek intention where there is none.
That theory struggles to explain why motion sensors installed in the Annex activated at the same time each night for three consecutive weeks.
Or why the activation logs show movement patterns resembling routine—room to room, floor to floor.
Always stopping at 11:45 p.m.
Always resuming the next evening.
The Annex remains officially vacant.
No permits have been issued. No renovations approved. No occupants listed.
And yet, neighbors report that some nights, the lights inside turn off one by one, as if someone is finishing up for the day.
Those who live nearby say the building doesn’t feel abandoned.
It feels in use.
As if the city simply forgot to account for whatever moved in
after everyone else left.
3 responses to “Ep. 9: The Carlton Annex”
If it stops every night at the same time, what happens if someone’s inside when it doesn’t?
Old buildings make noise and people love to mythologize them. That said, the lack of power records paired with lights is genuinely strange.
The idea of a building being “in use” without people is somehow worse than it being haunted. That last paragraph stuck with me.