A building manager has become a real life ghostbuster, using her paranormal technology to help spirits move on, and says paranormal investigating can be done on a budget during the cost-of-living crisis.

Spooky superfan, Sue Barlow, 45, from Worcester, became interested in the paranormal 10 years ago after joining a psychic development circle to hone her ability to connect with spirits.

After years of joining local groups, Sue was determined to become a professional paranormal investigator, setting up her own ghost-hunting group in June 2019.

Connecting with spirits around the UK, Sue and her team have become real-life ghostbusters, using technology to connect with spirits and help property owners get rid of any pesky ghosts causing trouble.

“I’ll be trying to sleep at night and have spirits trying to come through to me,” said Sue.

“You’ve got to be respectful and just politely say ‘Sorry, but not now’.

“I remember one time I was trying to get to sleep and I just had all these faces coming into my head and I’m like, ‘what is going on here?’

“You have to just learn how to do it and they do listen.”

A natural psychic, Sue was always interested in the paranormal but in 2012 she joined a psychic development group to hone her paranormal powers.

“I went for a reading with a medium and we got chatting,” she said.

“She said I definitely had an intuition and mentioned about joining a psychic development circle. I ended up going to her circle and then she started talking about ghost hunts.

“I always thought, no way, I won’t do anything like that, but the more I got into the paranormal the more interested I became.

“Once I went, I was hooked. I absolutely loved it. It was the unknown, the excitement of what you might see.”

Sue fell in love with ghost hunting and after years of learning she set up her own paranormal investigation group in June 2019, called On The Edge.

“The original ghost hunting team I went with closed down,” Sue explained.

“I decided to do it myself. I thought if I don’t try I don’t know. I didn’t have much money, it all started with a Facebook page and went from there.

“We try to do at least two events per month. I’ve gone from a small following to leading events with up to 30 guests.”

Sue not only converses with the dead, she helps property owners with pesky unwelcome spirits.

“We would go to a regular place that was an old bank that is now a shop,” she said.

“We went there quite often, about once a month. There was a lot of activity, especially a nasty man in the basement. He punched people in the stomach.

“His name was Henry and he used to be the bank manager, but he was not a very nice person at all.

“He didn’t like women, he saw them as a threat. He didn’t like me and he didn’t like the owner of the shop. He was just vile and was not nice to women, let’s put it that way.

“We did try to get him to move on. I mean, I tried twice. Things did quieten down after we had done that.

“He was quite tough. He did calm down, but he refused to move on.”

But Sue says that not all ghosts are bad.

“They do joke around with us,” she said.

“We do get them coming through occasionally where they just want to mess with us. They won’t give us correct information.

“They’ll pretend to be different people to try and trick us.”

To track any paranormal activity, Sue has an array of ghost-hunting gear.

“We use K2 metres, electricians use them to detect wires,” she said.

“The lights detect any electromagnetic energy in the area, so it goes from green to red.

“We use dowsing rods as well, you hold them in your hands and they point out in front of you. They were used for detecting water sources, but they also are good at detecting spirits.

“We have SLS cameras, basically if there are any spirits there it will show you them in the form of stickman figures. We do EVP as well, which is sound recordings.”

And Sue even lays out Scrabble and Jenga for the spirits.

“We use trigger objects, like flashy balls and little cars,” she said.

“We actually use scrabble tiles and we’ve also got Jenga. We don’t get to play them but we do put them out.

“We’ll take pictures at the start and then lock them off in a room and then go back in later and take a picture and have a look to see if anything’s moved.

“The best piece of equipment that we can probably have is ourselves.

“We do a human pendulum. Everyone stands in a circle, someone stands in the middle with two team members either side.

“We then get the spirit to move the person in the middle. It’s quite a weird experience when you’re being moved.”

And Sue insists paranormal investigating does not have to be costly, revealing how to connect with the unknown on a budget.

“I think with the cost of living and the pandemic, that’s obviously all had a big impact on us at the moment as well,” she said.

“I would advise beginners to do something similar to me. For someone who wants to develop their psychic abilities they should start going to a development circle and to go on a ghost hunt.

“We try to make them as affordable as possible, and there’s also a social aspect as you get to know like-minded people.”

However, she reminds budding enthusiasts that not everything is a sign of a ghost.

“We do try and think OK, is there an explanation for that or is it paranormal?” Sue said.

“I think some guests just want something to happen that much that they will subconsciously do it themselves. We stop it when we see it.

“We’re not like (TV series) Most Haunted, I’ve actually never seen an episode of the show.

“Some nights will be flat as a pancake whereas some we’ll have lots of activity but nothing is fake.”