(I think/hope) the neighborhood kids keep randomly ding dong ditching our house...

It is the halloween season, and a random ring of the doorbell does nothing to rustle my jimmies.... with that being said the frequency and timing of when it's been rung is kind of weird.

We've lived in the neighborhood about a year (new house with offset driveway and attached garage that sits around 75' from the road, 20 year old neighborhood of 1+ acre homesites), neighbor kids seem cool to me, and I've never told anyone to get off my lawn.

1-2 times a week the doorbell has been getting rung at random times in the evening... the first time it was less than a minute after my wife walked through the front door, I immediately answered it and no one was there.. no kids around either.

Another time my wife was working in the kitchen with the front picture window blinds open, and it rang.... it's never been when I'm in view of the front room or front door except for the one time I was half asleep on the couch.

One time it rang right at dusk, and I walked out and all the neighbor kids were playing soccer about 200 yards away... odd that one would take off just to ring mine and no others and run right back to the game.

I stopped the group of boys that run the neighborhood once and shook them down over it, but they just answered that they had not seen anything, and I believe they were being truthful.

The lot adjacent to our left is undeveloped, but one could easily walk through the pine underbrush, so is the lot across the street although it has some low areas and briers.

I'm hoping its not some weirdo that has taken affection to the wife or something sneaking through the wooded area to prank the house...

We won't be in this house but for a few more months, as we are moving in the spring - I don't really want to set up a full on camera system.

We don't have wifi at the house - what is the easiest way to set up an old iphone / game cam / or camera setup to watch the front door?

House is haunted by the ghost a 14 year-old boy that died of a broken heart after the previous owner wouldn't befriend him. Dibs on OP's guns!

If you don't believe in ghosts, pick up a video baby monitor at a second-hand store or borrow one from a friend.

I would try a trail cam from the store. or motion active light. GL

Shocking

I think the biggest issue here is not having wifi in your house

We leave the front porch, and garage front lights on in the evenings... so they are definitely not scared of the light.

Set up a trail camera.....

Just disconnect the doorbell.

Wife and I both have mobile hot spots paid for by work, and don't watch enough TV to get on the whole streaming bandwagon.

+1 for trail cam, or try a bear trap strategically placed near door bell

https://www.amazon.com/ScareCrow-Motion-Activated-Animal-Repellent/dp/B000071NUS

Talking to my brother in law yesterday, same damn thing happening to them, going on 5 years now. Random doorbell rings, no one there. Last week, he was out in the front yard, wife said the doorbell rang. Obviously nobody at the front door. He notices that the neighbors 2 doors down just had a UPS box dropped off moments ago...that's odd. He walks over, asks the neighbor to ring the doorbell at his house.

Sure as shit, both had wireless doorbells on the same frequency lol. About every 3rd ring it would trip his off.

.
Is it a wireless doorbell?





Could be a low battery or you are getting interference from another device.
http://www.1800doorbell.com/resources/avoiding-interference-answer.htm





If not, random ringing  could be a mechanical or wiring issue.  





 

Oh dear lol.

Sounds like something is causing the circuit to close intermittently.

Have you pulled the switch itself and checked the connections?

Highly likely this is the culprit, never put any thought into it since its a new house.

We never called it ding dong ditch

We got one of them to keep our dog out of our garden. It's not nearly as cool as it sounds.

Seriously, OP.

It's called Doorbell Dixie.

We used to ding-dong ditch the local grocery store when I was a kid.  Would run up and hit the delivery bell out back and run away.  One day right before my buddy hit the bell somebody opened the door and threw a bucket of water on him.  We laughed so hard on the walk home we almost pissed ourselves.

Put some crazy glue on the door bell...

If you see this out the front door, I would suggest moving.

 
There you go.  

lol, us either.... the world is too PC now.

Had the same thing happen to me, turns out neighbor 4 doors away had the same Honeywell wireless doorbell. Adjust the frequency settings and you should be fine.

If it's a wired db try replacing the unit...they can get stuck/go bad after years in the elements.

Is that from something? That is cool as hell.

Pit traps.

It'd be pretty simple if it were just burka ghosts....wouldn't even have to lead 'em that much.

Motion sensor water sprinkler near front door.  Or disconnect door bell but keep the sprinkler.  Install Game cam for some funny times.

Same answer as the scarecrow sprinkler... wife unit would not be pleased when she set them off...

Hopefully it's just a doorbell malfunction or kids being kids. Worst case is that someone is casing your house to find out when you're not home. I say get a camera.

Doorbell malfunction or another wireless devices on the same frequency sounds about right.

Everyone has ding dong ditch stories.

The old guy down the road ran a general store and kept rabbit dogs out back.  He told my Dad and I one day that kids kept ding dong ditching him and they would always run and jump in the ditch in front of his place along the road.  

So he cleaned out the dog pen and threw all the crap in the ditch.  With a laugh he said it stop them completely but he did say they quit hitting that ditch.  

If not a malfunction, a trail cam sounds like a great idea.  At least you will get a chance to see who it is.

They're not ding dong ditching...  They're doing something else.  

I'm bored sheesh you have no sense of humor

We called it "knocky door ginger".

Ha ha ha yea we called it uh well &^$^*&%%* knocking

 Me too

 
Yeah, we called that something entirely different when i was a kid -- different era.

OK.

How about:

Pour a 50/50 mix of Dawn dish detergent and water on your front porch.  The little buggers will hit the deck like a ton of bricks.



Put some Loctite anti-seize compound on your doorbell.  They'll have it all over the place and it makes tracking down the offending miscreant simpler.



Mean dog, long chain.  What would be really fun would be a way to release said dog when the door bell is activated.  You can get a mean dog fairly easy listed as "free to a good home" in most ads.  



Wire the door bell to a claxon horn mounted on the porch.  It'll scare the living shit out of them.  Then they'll fall in the dish soap mix.  While they're struggling to get up your new free dog can have a little snack.



Trap door directly under the door bell button.  Push the button and it drops whoever into an alligator pit.  



It's Halloween.  Make it fun.  

Why wouldn't you install cameras?  It's much better to put cameras in before a break in/incident than decide you need them after.

Why are you moving from a new home?

Get a dog but if that won't work for you then get a sign.

OP next week...

claymores

had this happen to us twice. Once, mechanical failure, other time,  neighborhood kids.


Mechanical failure: two wires shorting out in the doorbell switch. Wind pressure on door or even walking past would cause vibration and cause them to short out and ring the bell.  When I finally tracked it down the wires were all blackened and had been sparking some. I was ready to literally shoot every kid in the neighborhood.  I spent a lot of time running around with a flashlight looking for the little bastards. which weren't there.  



Second time: neighborhood kids went to TOWN on us.  Multiple times a night, almost every day.  Finally got my kids G36 airsoft rifle, loaded it up with BB's and slapped an EOTech and NV on it.  After the first ring I sprinted out and hid in the bushes about ten feet from my door hidden under a brown fuzzy blanket my wife had on her when it was fo time.

ten minutes later kids creep up and just as he hits the bell I unload on his ass and legs with the airsoft.  About 8 balls a second at just under 400fps,  those little bastards hurt and I completely hosed him down.

He vaults off the step into the rose bushes,   screaming bloody murder and runs away covered in welts and torn up from the rose thorns.


he runs to the church next door with his friends and starts yelling at me, super pissed,  he has no idea where I am cause I'm under a brown blanket under some bushes. He's just yelling and screaming how he's going to get me.  Then he decides to moon me.

Do you know what someone mooning you looks like through NV? It looks a LOT like a target. I could not resist and plastered his now naked ass with a long string from the G36.   He screeched like a scalded cat, and not having learned his lesson the first time, lurched into some bushes for protection, this time with his pants down around his ankles and thrashed around yelling.


he compadres fled the area laughing  in a hail of airsoft bullets,  Mr Moon thrashing around and screaming trying to get out of the bushes by the church, yelling the whole time about his asshole and how I'm a faggot. Based on the yelling and insults, there's a pretty high probability at least one of the airsoft pellets found it's way to his sensitive regions, and may have actually traveled up the down spout.

I started laughing so hard I couldn't even stand up,  My ribs hurt from laughing for three days.


and we never NEVER been doorbell ditched again.  Literally ever.

sometimes the simplest answers...


seriously, this is what I did

 

I rather enjoyed this read