My house (Vlindrel Hall) has been ransacked several times in Markarth. At first I thought it was a glitch, and I would just reload the game - problem fixed. But after several times of this happening, I finally did a closer inspection of things around the house ... something seems to be happening that is NOT a glitch.

I started asking NPC's around Markarth and I don't seem to get a response that would suggest a quest for this problem.

If there is a quest to put the house "back in order", which NPC do I need to speak to start the quest? Thank you for any suggestions (hints) that would help.

This is quite frankly, Odd. I use it because of the Stonework, and it's fine, are you the Jarl?

Do you have the huscarl? They tend to put houses in disarray... a lot :I

haha.. no I do not have the Housecarl for Markarth because I am not yet Thane. I have Lydia for my housecarl for Breezhome in Whiterun, and she is very well behaved.

Not sure, the only mention of a problem like this I've seen is someone saying they dont use the game's player-owned houses because thieves can steal their stuff. Never had this problem though...

I am begininning to think that no one has had this problem, except me. If there's a thread for "weirdest glitches" (other than the famed "backward flying dragon") then this certainly falls into that category. I have checked for similar threads on all the Skyrim forums ... and I found one other player who mentioned about his Markarth house being "ransacked", but everyone there thinks it's a glitch. So it seems to be what it is ... a glitch, and NOT anything related to a quest.

Oh well, I'm stuck with a house with items scattered and "knocked over". I mean really, every room has things knocked over, and on the floor.

I know about the weapons rack's not working in other houses, and certain "personal items" that people try to place on shelves and then later being lost or knocked over. But I haven't "touched" anything in my house other than switching out weapons and armor (and those racks work in my house).

At one my point, my enchantment table was GONE (when this happened, I reloaded the game), and that room was a complete mess. Strangely, all my weapons on the racks were intact.

WARNING to Markarth house owners: beware of the phantom whirlwind, this could happens to you.

You know, it would make for a great mod to have some random quests that have a chance of triggering when you buy a house without being a member of the Thieves Guild. Your house gets a Shadowmark and there's a small chance that it will be ransacked, and a single valuable item will be stolen, every few days and your Housecarl is tied up or unconscious on the floor. Joining the TG will change the Shadowmark so that your house is off limits as will completing a series of quests that lead you to the culprit(s).

Maybe you should do Molag Bal's quest. His Haunted House also has a "phantom whirlwind".

I've read in the hardware and software problems section of the forums that a glitch makes this happen, Bethesda has said somewhere that if you place things yourself in certain places in a house they move when you enter the house, they also say if you place them a second time they stay put.

I don't know if it's related to one house or all player owned houses, but from what I've read it is a glitch not a break in, your house is the only place items can't go missing, as far as I'm aware of anyway.

I own this house myself, along with the one in Dawnstar but don't use them as Breezehome is beside the smith for selling armor weapons and crafting, plus I can't be bothered moving all my stored gear to another location.

Thanks everyone for your comments.

@ Sokar Rosau - ya, that is a great mod idea. Too bad that kind of thing wasn't build into the original game, then I would have really considered joining the Thieves Guild.

@AmauriPavao - I look into that quest

@GazzaHo - I am rechecking that section of the forums. It's the one forum I didn't spend much time looking for answers.

I am not reloading the game to get everything back the way it was. But it makes me wary about storing my things in there. Luckily I have my Breezehome that is properly storing everything. I'll just pretend that my Markarth house has this strange phantom poltergeist lurking around.

The physics glitches some people report happening after disabling vsync sound like they could cause this, for example eratic behavior of collision detection which can cause objects and actors to sink through and then bounce or fly out of solid surfaces when being loaded.

I've seen Mamoths floating in the sky and a dog half in the ground, and I've literally knocked enemy's into Oblivion, so to speak, right through the ground with a fireball spell, no body shows up, I've actually watched them fall through the ground. I've even fell through the ground in a few places myself a few times, so the collision detection can be a problem at times. Nothing surprises me with this game.