The Conjuring House: Separating Fact from Fiction on One of America's Most Notorious Haunted Locations
“Expectation is the enemy of good evidence — and when every person walking through that door has already watched a horror film set in that exact building, you're fighting psychological priming the entire time. That's what makes the Conjuring House one of the hardest locations to investigate properly.”
— Jason Hawes
The Conjuring House in Harrisville, Rhode Island is one of the most talked-about locations in paranormal history — and also one of the most misunderstood. I've been getting questions about it for years, and I finally sat down to answer them straight. If you want the real story, stripped of Hollywood mythology and sensationalized claims, let's talk about what we actually know.
I get asked about the Conjuring House more than almost any other location, and honestly, that tells you something about the power of a good movie. The 2013 film did an incredible job of burning that farmhouse into the public consciousness, but it also did something that frustrates me as an investigator — it blurred the line between documented evidence and dramatic storytelling in a way that's been almost impossible to untangle ever since. So when people come to me asking whether the house is really haunted, my first job is to separate what the Perron family actually reported experiencing from what the Warrens claimed, what the filmmakers invented, and what subsequent investigators have documented on their own terms.
My approach to any location, including this one, starts with skepticism. That's not cynicism — it's respect for the people who lived there and the people who are still seeking answers. The Perron family's experiences were real to them, and Andrea Perron has spoken extensively and compellingly about what her family went through during their years in that farmhouse. Strange sounds, unexplained smells, objects moving, a persistent feeling of being watched — these are the kinds of reports that get my attention not because they automatically mean something paranormal is happening, but because they're consistent, long-term, and came from multiple witnesses independently. That's the profile of a case worth taking seriously.
What I always caution people about, though, is the layering effect that happens with famous locations. The Conjuring House has now had so many investigators, so many overnight guests, so many content creators walk through it that the baseline has been completely contaminated. When you're investigating a location that has been sensationalized on a global scale, you have to account for the psychological priming that every single person brings through the door. Expectation is the enemy of good evidence. People hear a creak and they jump to conclusions because they've already watched a horror film set in that exact building. I've seen it happen countless times, and it's one of the hardest variables to control for. That doesn't mean nothing genuine has ever happened there — it means you have to work twice as hard to find evidence that stands on its own.
During my live Q&A session, I walked through some of the historical research surrounding the property, because history is always where I start. The land itself has a documented past that predates the Perron family by centuries, and understanding that context matters. I also talked about the methodology I'd apply if I were to go in and do a full investigation — controlling the environment, eliminating natural explanations for sounds and temperature fluctuations, using equipment properly and not just for effect. One of the things I stressed to the folks watching is that the scariest-looking piece of gear in the world means nothing if you don't understand what it's actually measuring and what can cause false readings. A drafty old New England farmhouse is going to light up EMF readers and produce all kinds of audio artifacts. You have to rule all of that out before you even begin to consider anything else. The conversation was a good one, and the community brought some genuinely sharp questions to the table — which is exactly what I love about these live sessions.
The Conjuring House is a fascinating case precisely because it sits at the intersection of genuine human experience, historical mystery, and modern paranormal celebrity — and pulling those threads apart takes patience and discipline. My verdict remains what it always is until the evidence says otherwise: deeply interesting, worthy of serious investigation, and nowhere near fully explained. Keep asking the hard questions.