This is wild. I believe you, because this would be a seriously weird thing for you to put so much effort into lying about, but I really had no idea. This is still the case even if the person is found and removed very promptly after they've died?
Yes. Yes a million times. Let me elaborate a little bit. The house situation is only a coincidence. I had already known about this before.
A few years back, I was feeling suicidal. Every night I went on Google and searched "found a dead body Reddit". I did this for a few weeks, a few hours every night. I read probably nearly a hundred stories in all.
Out of all of them, there are many shitty factors that come with dead bodies, but hands down the worst was the smell. I just finally got to experience it in real life. After reading all that Reddit, my roommate didn't want to believe it, but I knew what the smell was. Then we confirmed it. The law says they don't have to tell you, BUT, if you ASK, they do have to tell you. They can't lie. At least, that's my understanding, and they did tell us, albeit unwillingly. I confronted them head on and repeatedly asked. They hated that.
But let me give you an idea of the story I remember the most. It's not terribly gross or morbid but it made me understand how much this really is a big deal.
There was a guy who's friend's grandpa died. In the house where he died, there was a nice flatscreen TV. None of the family wanted the TV because they were too upset about the death, but they offered it to the friend. The friend took the TV. When they dropped the TV off, instantly, after getting it in the house, everyone was getting sick and gagging. The family had gotten used to it from working in grandpas house all day, claiming his belongings. The smell of the dead body had permeated the TV. Given, a TV isn't even porous like drywall or carpet or wood. It's plastic and circuit boards. It doesn't "soak up smells". But the smell of a corpse permeates anything and everything. Even metal air ducting, which has to be cleaned with special remediation.
Unless you get that body out within minutes, you are going to have smell problems.
Once a dead body has sat inside a house for a day....good luck. That smell is going to be there awhile.
It's actually, my understanding at least, an evolutionary thing. The smell of dead humans is extremely, extremely, extremely strong to us because it's evolutionarily important to stay away from dead bodies.
I've heard of firefighters and EMTs who get home after working with a body and the smell is still in their nose, they inhale soap up their nose in the shower till it burns but it's still there. Police officers who enter a home with a respirator and puke inside the respirator because they can smell it through.
I'm serious. You can ask anyone who's ever smelled a dead body. Read the stories on Reddit. I'm lucky I only smelled remnants, never the full thing. Probably the only thing worse for your family than killing yourself is making them smell you for the next two years.
Hotels have to do serious, serious remediation, and close off parts of the hotel after a death. Not to mention, scummy hotels just start to have a heavy smell like shit after awhile. Now you know partially why. But homes are somehow different from hotels too, structurally and otherwise.
Then again, some bodies probably smell really really bad, while a few get away with not being too terrible. People have died in walls and underneath beds without being discovered for awhile, with only smell complaints. But that's gotta be based on a million factors including, diet, body chemistry, genetics, weight, and a slew of other factors.
I'm sure there's more than a few who will think I'm exaggerating here. Please, do your own research. I have no reason to exaggerate. I only care to spread truth.