About a month ago, as he was lying in a hospital bed after a stroke, Kenny Enea had one main concern: Would the Halloween decorations be completed in time?
“The only thing he was worried about was getting out and finishing,” says Ana Lovelis, his partner of 32 years.
The Hatteras Haunted House in Sherman Oaks is in its eighth year, and is a mix of accumulated, handmade, store-bought and antique items.
(David Butow / For The Times)
After all, if the elaborate front-yard haunt wasn’t fully assembled by Oct. 31, eight months of work could be for naught. This is the eighth and final year Enea’s family of four will be remaking its Van Nuys property into a frightful, walk-through attraction that spooks thousands of visitors each Halloween.
Today, Enea, 62, is on the path to a full recovery, and the Hatteras Halloween House — its official name, based on the street that borders the home — was wrapped with days to spare. The family is planning a large-scale bash Friday featuring a tarot reader, a handful of actors and even a wedding: Lovelis and Enea have decided that after three-plus decades together, it’s time to tie the knot. Their two daughters, Nia and Rena Lovelis, both in their mid-20s, will serve as “best man” and maid of honor.
The Hatteras Halloween House has become one of the more well-known home haunts of the San Fernando Valley, a region now known for extravagant, do-it-yourself Halloween displays, especially in Burbank. To enter is to walk through a small cemetery before encountering a winding array of thematic spaces — a skeleton seated at a decrepit vintage piano gives way to a rickety bridge, a smooshy swampland, a doll-laden tea temple, a chapel and an exorcism room.
The Hatteras Halloween House started small as an accumulation of Halloween items but has gradually grown into an elaborately themed walk-through attraction.
(David Butow / For The Times)
The displays are so massive that when the facades for the bridge and mini church started taking shape, the family received a visit from a city inspector. A neighbor, says Nia, complained that the family was building an unsanctioned ADU.
“They thought it was an actual house extension,” Ana says. “We were like, ‘No, it’s Halloween decorations.’ The inspector came by, and I was like, ‘No, it’s foam.’”
One segment of the haunt is lighted by bloody hands holding plastic tea candles. Stairways to nowhere are hiding bones and body parts in their underbelly. Hand-written notes, courtesy of a narrative dreamed up by Nia, dot the space and hint at an enveloping backstory. An abstract, slow-waltz of a moody soundtrack, courtesy of Rena, sets the mysterious tempo. A mix of store-bought animatronics, handmade props and found objects — vintage lamps, creatures with elongated necks and an assortment of mystical, witchy knickknacks, fill every nook.
After eight haunted houses and 32 years together, Kenny Enea and Ana Lovelis will marry this Halloween inside the haunt’s church.
(David Butow / For The Times)
Consider it a collection of intimate rooms, each one holding new reveals and surprises. You may want to duck, for instance, if you spy a snake near a foggy water fountain. Elsewhere, a cabinet never stops quivering as we wait for its door to swing open. Months went into constructing the surrounding fences and the vintage-inspired covered wooden bridge — Enea and Ana run a construction firm — and luxuries such as vacations were skipped as the family estimates that not an evening or weekend went by without some work done on the haunted house. Ana puts the total cost at somewhere in the $20,000 range. And Rena is quick to joke, “Don’t ask about the DWP bill.”
The Hatteras Halloween House
In a way, the haunt feels like an extension of the family’s home. On a recent afternoon the four, plus Darragh Hettrick, Nia’s partner, were gathered in a living room that felt like a mix of an antique store, a tarot tent and an apothecary haven. Or perhaps the embodiment of a witch’s coven — candles, crystals and fantastical items (a small mermaid hangs on one wall) — grace the space.
“It’s not just Halloween,” Enea says. “We’re kind of drawn to the darker side of everything in life. Everything is just a little left of center. A lot left of center.”
“We’re looking to marry the dark with the light,” Ana says, noting she’s held a fascination with Halloween, costumes and masks since early childhood.
A creepy woman figure at The Hatteras Halloween House.
(David Butow / For The Times)
The family’s haunts at first started relatively modest — a hodgepodge of Halloween decorations. But in the last four years, especially, the couple and their children have experimented with various themes. Last year, for instance, was a “hell hotel,” with rooms themed to demented clowns or terror at sea. Other years they have experimented with aliens, complete with a 12-foot spaceship hanging above the proceedings.
It became a family craft project taken to its maximalist extreme. Ana says she wanted something the neighborhood kids could experience for free. Many neighbors started participating, either dropping off old Halloween decor or even acting in the haunt. Enea says the project brought him joy during our stressful and divisive cultural climate.
“In these times we’re experiencing in this country and the world, there’s no politics and there’s no religion here,” Enea says. “We’re literally just having a good time. There’s no left or right. Everyone is just in it, and having a good time. I see the experience of people coming through with the kids, and everyone is just so happy. Can’t we have that throughout the world? I know it’s Pollyanna thinking, but we can give this little section of Van Nuys happiness.”
The Hatteras Halloween House is estimated to have drawn about 3,000 people last Halloween.
(David Butow / For The Times)
Multiple home haunts throughout the San Fernando Valley have been garnering attention in the Southland in recent years. Jen Spincic in 2020 created the Halloween in Burbank and Beyond map and site to catalog them all. Spincic’s accompanying Instagram contains dives into some of the better known, which this year included a house that’s a mash-up of “Wicked” and “The Wizard of Oz,” a creepy exploration of all-things clowns and a joyous celebration of Disney-inspired culture.
“In the last three years it’s really exploded,” Spincic says. “More and more people are decorating. It’s a destination. I see that people on the news keep calling it ‘Halloween town.’”
Halloween in 2025 often stretches into the late summer, and increasingly there are conventions, theme parks and films that celebrate a spooky mood year-round. Spincic also attributes the growth to our cultural climate, theorizing people need community and tension-free places to rally around. “Nowadays everybody hates each other, with political differences or whatever it is,” Spincic says. “It brings people together. People are laughing, connecting and talking.”
Props, creepy antiques and weird dolls are found throughout the Hatteras Halloween House.
(David Butow / For The Times)
But it all raises a question. The Hatteras Halloween House clearly brings the family closer. Nia can talk for more than five minutes explaining the byzantine narrative she has constructed for the haunt. Rena speaks proudly of experimenting with jazzy sounds for the soundtrack (the two daughters were in the now-defunct L.A. rock band Hey Violet). Can they really give up the haunt?
Nia says the family is getting nostalgic for the days before they turned their home into a destination, when they explored the creativity and artwork of others.
“They bought a cabin and they want to spend time building that next year,” Nia says of her parents. “I don’t think we can do nothing. Mom and I will be out there next year putting up some props, but before we started doing the walk-throughs we would go to Reign of Terror (in Thousand Oaks), and all the home haunts. It was a tradition for the family.”
Enea says he also needs a break. This year he worked with the local fire department to ensure the haunt was up to code, and on Halloween night they have hired actors and security. But before Enea can relax, Anna is rattling off a series of dreams for the future — perhaps the family opens a Halloween-inspired pizza parlor, or maybe a “haunted” home that can be rented out.
“My ideas are endless,” she says. “I just have to figure out how to pull Kenny in on it.”
And moments after the family talks about the haunted house’s retirement, for instance, they also speak excitedly of the Krampus figure they purchased that will make an appearance this Christmas season. They may be able to remove the haunt from the yard, but don’t expect the Hatteras house to completely go quietly into the night.
The Hatteras Halloween House comes with an elaborate, slightly hidden backstory for guests who want to dig deep.
(David Butow / For The Times)