New Home Owners Couldn't Believe It When the FBI Burst into Their House to Search Their Basement



New Home Owners Couldn’t Believe It When the FBI Burst into Their House to Search Their Basement

Buying a house in America can be pretty harsh for one’s pocket. Unfortunately, real estate is expensive, and not everyone can afford to buy a beautiful house ready to be lived in. So when a young couple made the decision to buy a house, they went for a fixer-upper style in the midwestern part of the United States. Buying the house that way was the most affordable decision they could make, and also a good way to give a unique meaning to starting their life together.

Terrible Conditions


So when the Reddit user Lmbrjack shared his story online, everyone was intrigued. When he and his wife bought the house, they knew they had a long way ahead of them. The house was in such terrible conditions that they would have to put a lot of time renovating it and transforming it into the house of their dreams.

Thus, as soon as they moved into the house, they started the renovations. What they didn’t know though, is that a simple renovation of their new basement would result in the FBI knocking on their door.


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The Purchase Of Their Lives


Lmbrjack and his wife’s journey to this house adventure started all the way back in 2004. The couple really wanted to buy a house, but they couldn’t afford to buy most houses. So in order to save money, the young couple decided to purchase a house somewhere in the outskirts of Cleveland.

The couple was ecstatic. They had finally made the purchase of their lives and were happy with their choice. They couldn’t wait to move in and to start making things their own. But as they moved in, they were aware that a long renovation journey was ahead of them.
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An Abandoned Basement


The whole house had quite a bit of repairing to be done, but the basement, in particular, was in pretty bad shape. So it made sense for the couple to start the renovations in the basement since it was the part of the house that needed the most.

As the happy couple started, they had no idea that they were in for an adventurous treat – this renovation was about to change their lives completely. Just before he started the task, he realized just how bad the basement’s condition was. He had never seen a place so badly taken care of beforehand.


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All In Vain


The basement’s walls were completely covered in graffiti, the actual walls were basically falling apart, there had been a number of infiltrations in the ceiling, and the list went on. Yet, this was about to be his dream house, so nothing discouraged Lmbrjack. He was ready and determined to make this work.

Plus, he wasn’t alone, and although the couple realized that somewhere down the line they would probably need some professional help, they were ready to start working on it by themselves. As they put their hands to work, unfortunately, none of them knew then that all the work they were about to put in would eventually be completely in vain.
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A Strange Suitcase


The first thing Lmbrjack did was to take the ceiling of the basement. He thought that that would be the most natural step to the renovation. But as soon as he did that, he found an old suitcase hidden away. He had seen a lot of old things lying around in the basement, but nothing similar to the old and dusty suitcase in front of him.

It was obvious the suitcase hadn’t been casually forgotten by whoever had lived there before. Someone had purposely gone out of their way to hide the suitcase away, to a place where no one would be able to find it.
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A Heavy Suitcase


Lmbrjack called his wife down to the basement, as he had decided to open the suitcase and see what was inside. But he didn’t want to do it by himself. The suitcase was small but really heavy and seemed to hold something important.

Before opening it, they pondered around the possibility of not opening it, and giving it back to the previous owners instead, or even calling the police. But their instinct told them to open the suitcase first, and then deal with the consequences.
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Playing A Little Game


So the couple grabbed the suitcase and went outside. Because they didn’t know what could possibly inside, they preferred to open the suitcase outside of the house instead of staying alone in the basement. They then started playing a guessing game, just so they could extend the exciting moment.

They both took turns in grabbing the suitcase and listening to the noise it made when they shook it. There was no way they could guess what was inside, but still, no one could take that moment away from the happy couple.
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A Disappointment


His wife guessed that in the inside they would find a pile of old pictures. Lmbrjack, on the other hand, guessed that they would find a bunch of valuable documents or something like old baseball cards. For all they knew, this could be some sort of treasure that was about to change their lives.

Finally, they opened the suitcase. As they looked inside, both of them were equally disappointed. All they could see was a pile of three rectangular shapes completely wrapped in wax paper.
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Peeling Away


The case also had a random banana brush casually lying in there. Slowly, both of them started peeling away the paper. And that’s when things started getting really exciting. As they peeled the waxing paper, they started seeing what looked like old stacks of cash.

They tried to not get too excited, but it had become impossible. The couple kept finding twenty-dollar bills carefully organized and in good shape. They could see that the money had been there for a while, as the bills were old and weren’t in use anymore.
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An Incredible Discovery


The couple started jumping up and down of happiness. There could be thousands of dollars in that suitcase, and it could be theirs. When he shared the story online, he explained that neither he nor his wife could believe their eyes.

He claimed that things like that didn’t happen to people like them, in fact, they had gotten used to struggling for most of their lives. Soon they realized though that wasn’t the end. As they opened the other two bundles, both of them also contained money.
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More And More Money


Different from the first bundle though, the second one had notes of $50, and thus contained much more money than the first one. When they opened the third one, it had a stack of $100 notes.

At that point, they were both losing their minds. They thought that there could be more than 5 grand in that suitcase, and all of it could be theirs. As the build-up wound down, the couple started asking the inevitable questions.
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Asking The Right Questions


As exciting as it was to randomly find money hidden away in their new purchase basement, the couple still had to be rational about the situation. They wondered, where on earth had all of that money come from? The bills seemed to be as old as from sometime around the 1920s and 1930s.

The suitcase was definitely old enough to be from around that time as well. Could it be that the suitcase and the stack of money had been hidden away for that long?
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An Old Newspaper


Beneath the old stacks of cash, Lmbrjack found what would be his first clue. He encountered a warn copy of The Cleveland Plain-Dealer, a local newspaper. Just like the bundles of cash, the newspaper looked fairly old. He looked at the date and realized that he was right.

The newspaper dated back to March 25, 1951. That took them to the conclusion that the old suitcase had been hidden away for something like 65 years.
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Star Bills


Then, the couple started wondering how much the old stack of cash would be worth. Could it be that it had all became an antique, or could it actually be worth thousands of dollars? The more responsible decision they could make would be to take the cash to a lawyer and attempt to understand how much they were worth.

After analyzing the notes, the lawyer shared an interesting fact. Some of those notes were actually star bills, which meant that they had never been circulated before.
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Worth Thousands And Thousands


He then shared that the bills were considered antiques, and had probably belonged to a collector. If Lmbrjack decided to sell them, he could make around $23,000. Needless to say that the couple was beyond excited for finding out how much money they could make from their discovery.

Yet, while the couple had made this incredible find, they still had to renovate their entire basement. So they decided to pause the moment and headed back to the home renovations. Eventually, Lmbrjack found a second suitcase.
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A Second Suitcase


Since his wife was at work when he found the suitcase, he decided to wait for her to get home, so they could once again open the suitcase together.

The anticipation increased, and he hoped he would find a similar bundle of money in the second suitcase. When his wife got home, they finally opened the suitcase. They once again discovered thousands of dollars, and couldn’t keep their excitement. This time, the money was organized in stacks of cash, instead of being wrapped in wax paper like in the previous suitcase.
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More Money


When they took the second suitcase to their lawyer, they realized that this one had even more money than the first one. They had earned around $45,000 in cash just like that, out of the blue. Since they continued getting lucky with the basement discoveries, he decided to explore further.

They could find many more valuable things after all. And that’s exactly what they did. In the basement, they found an extra hidden room, big enough to fit at least five people. But the couple had a strange feeling about this room.
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A Strange Room


The room was extremely random, making Lmbrjack and his wife wonder what its purpose could possibly be. The room also had a medicine cabinet that had been untouched for years. But one door of the room was heavily locked. So they went back to the house and collected all the tools they needed to break down the door.

When they finally opened it, they were stunned. Lmbrjack found a black safe and a large area that was big enough to have a single bed in it. The whole space’s structure made it seem like whoever had built it, wanted it to be waterproof.
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Another Briefcase


In addition to all of the strange things they found, the couple also stumbled upon a brown briefcase. Not wasting any time, Lmbrjack and his wife opened the briefcase. Just like the other two suitcases, the brown briefcase had money inside. But this one contained something else in addition to the money.

They could see four silver ingots, that valued around $80. A jewelry box and a tiny chest could also be found inside, with rings, bracelets, tie clips and old watches. It basically looked like a treasure box, just like we see it in the movies.
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Things Became Creepier


Afterward, the couple moved on to the black safe they had found. After wrestling around with it for a while, they were finally able to open it. That’s when things became really creepy. In the safe, Lmbrjack found a note with the words ‘Save Yourself’ written on it.

As he started feeling a bit concerned about the situation he was in, he simultaneously hoped that the whole thing was some kind of joke. But things were just about to get started.
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Looking Deeper, More Warnings


As they looked deeper into the box, the couple found another creepy note. The warning said ‘do not’, and nothing else. Below the note, they could see a number of old VHS-C cassettes. With this find, the couple started to finally think if it wasn’t just better to involve the police.

One of the tapes had the words ‘no no no no no’ written on it, and Lmbrjack became more and more terrified. Despite his fear, he was curious and wondered whether or not the tapes would clarify everything once and for all. So he decided to listen to the first tape.
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Under Investigation


He was mid-tape when Lmbrjack finally decided to call the authorities. It was all too much for him, and he was afraid that he and his wife would get into some kind of trouble. Things escalated so quickly, that on the same day, the FBI was knocking on his door.

The moment they arrived, the FBI removed everything from the house and didn’t let the couple touch it ever again. They then launched a full-scale investigative case and stopped the couple from renovating their house any further as long as it is under investigation.
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A Full Investigation


Suddenly, their newly purchased house was surrounded by police cars and FBI officials, investigating every corner of the place. At some point, they even had fire trucks on their entrance. Unfortunately for them, the authorities took everything they found, as it had become the property of an FBI investigation at that point.

The good thing is that the couple wasn’t in any trouble though. In fact, Lmbrjack was commended for doing the right thing, when he called the authorities. The couple was left wondering what had happened in their new home as the FBI refused to give them any information. Even though the FBI couldn’t share everything they had found, they shared that there was enough on the tapes to start a full investigation, but that was all. Eventually, the couple got their house back and continued living their lives without ever knowing what really happened there!