Squatters: Get the F*** Out of My House (2026) s01e02 Episode Script

[news anchor 1]
Homeowners all across the country
run into issues with squatters.
[news anchor 2] Squatters are ready
to make your house their home.
[person 1] happening right under
our noses and nobody knew.
[person 2] Get the fuck out of my house.
Malibu's stunning. We have the ocean,
we have the hills, we have the wildlife.
[seagulls squawk]
We have so many interesting people
from so many diverse backgrounds.
Entertainment, and beautiful homes,
beautiful beaches.
I have lived in Malibu for 15 years.
People are very friendly.
Everybody knows each other.
It's a beautiful tight-knit community,
and that all changed
when Ellie Mae appeared.
[Ellie Mae] Where are you going?
[news anchor 3] And now,
Malibu has a new problem, squatters.
I said, "Ellie, you're a parasite.
Get out of my house."
I first met Ellie Mae, I think,
back in 2019.
I was doing yoga at the studio.
She befriended me,
and was always seeking me out after class.
She's very warm and very engaging.
She's very friendly.
She has a posh English accent.
Yeah, I'm in love, basically.
This is my cat,
so I'm just letting him run wild.
A lot of people assumed
that she was just part of the landscape,
and because you saw her everywhere
She was often seen wandering around town
or on the beach with her cat,
Liger, in tow.
She spent her days
doing yoga and eating out.
She would go live on Instagram
and read a Shakespeare play
over several days.
Hi, welcome to your cozy bedtime story
by Shakespeare.
This is
The Tragedy of King Richard the Third.
She was an actress.
I figured she had a family
that was supporting her lifestyle
in Malibu back in the UK.
One time, I was going on a hike,
and she joined me,
and it seemed
a little like she was exaggerating
about her connections.
She was name-dropping
and, you know, saying
she was friends with Amy Poehler.
It seemed a little far-fetched.
I know she did a show
off Broadway in the '90s,
and that was really the extent
of her work.
She seemed to me
like an eccentric, friendly,
kind of harmless person
that maybe had illusions of grandeur.
[Ellie Mae] Have you ever had that dream
when you're falling, then you wake up?
My very first impression
when I met Ellie was
she was just a really relaxed, chill girl.
She just seemed like another
typical actress in Los Angeles trying
to make her way into the industry,
and she had posted all kinds of pictures
with all kinds of different celebrities,
and she had a picture with David Lynch,
but I didn't get the impression
that she had done very much.
My roommate and I had
a three-bedroom place.
We had a spare room
that we needed to fill.
Now at that time,
I-I wasn't making the kind of money
that made me feel
in any way financially secure
by not having this room filled,
and this is how the whole thing started.
So my roommate, Kessia, posted
on the LEE list to find a roommate.
She said, "I found this new girl.
She's going to move in."
"Did you get a deposit?"
Kessia said,
"No, I didn't get one, but it's fine.
Her uncle's helping her pay everything,
and she's going to send it to us
in about a week."
And I said, "Okay, no problem."
Finding out that Ellie was an actress,
it made perfect sense to me.
She's part of our same community,
which helped us trust her even more.
We're actors, we're filmmakers.
She was quiet,
she didn't cause any problems.
It wasn't until about seven days
after she moved in that I asked Kessia,
"Can you please ask Ellie again
about the security deposit?"
And she gave us an excuse
that her uncle was away
and he couldn't do this,
and she was just evasive.
We would ask her every day,
and her-her energy did start to shift,
but it wasn't a hostility.
It was like she just
she was getting tired of us asking.
[muffled voices chattering]
Around that time,
I started to have a bad feeling,
-so I opened the door to her room
-[door creaks]
and I looked inside,
and I-I saw her box of clothing.
But none of the clothes were
hanging in the closet,
which I found to be a little bit odd.
And there was an altar on the floor,
which there's nothing wrong
with having a Buddhist altar
on the floor either, but it was just
something about the way the room looked.
And I brought Kessia over,
I was like, "Hey, look in her room,"
and I said, "Does anything here look odd?"
And Kessia goes, "Yeah [chuckling]
I can't really put my finger on it,
but it is a weird vibe."
And she goes,
"I'm starting to get the impression
that we might've been duped."
[muffled voices chattering]
[Gurvitz] So, we started approaching her
a lot more aggressively.
Uh, we were more insistent on the fact
that she had to pay.
-[line ringing]
-[Gurvitz] We would call her,
we would send her text messages,
and she wouldn't respond to them.
-[automated voice] at the tone.
-[line beeps]
There was a lot of tension in the house.
Ellie always would talk super softly.
One time,
I got really, really angry with her.
I went right up to her face and I said,
"You know, you're gonna
get the fuck out of our house."
And she says, "Well, I don't understand
why you're so angry."
And no matter how angry we got at her,
she just stayed the same.
It was like she was this Chucky doll,
like she had so much power over us
that the more angry we got,
it made us weaker.
And so it'd genuinely feel
like she had invaded our home
and was terrorizing us,
but she did it with a smile.
[laughs]
[Gurvitz] At about the 30-day mark,
Ellie's demeanor completely changed.
She began to be a lot more hostile.
She said,
"I'm not leaving. This is my house,
and it is against the law
for you to force me out."
I was floored.
I realized in this moment
that we really had a squatter
on our hands.
We were super angry
and we just didn't understand
how a human being could be so diabolical.
Ellie Mae was very adamant
that it was her house,
and that there was nothing we could do
to get her to leave,
and she felt very, very confident in this,
and that's entirely
because she knew the law was on her side.
[laughter]
For years, squatters took advantage
of a legal loophole
that allowed them to live in homes
and apartments that didn't belong to them.
My name's Dan Krauth.
I've been called the squatter reporter
because I've uncovered
a lot of squatter cases over the years.
California is one
of the most attractive states to squatters
because its real estate laws are
so lenient.
And Ellie Mae McNulty knew
how to exploit all of the legal loopholes.
[Gurvitz]
We learned about squatters' rights.
We can't get her out.
We can't even touch her stuff.
Hi. [laughs]
We realized that we were screwed,
that it would take six months
or longer to evict her,
and would cost us
about $15,000 to $20,000.
And I think if I wasn't so trusting,
we wouldn't have been in this situation.
When you're renting to people,
you have to understand
the laws of your state.
One decision can change everything.
Many homeowners really feel powerless
when someone does something like this.
If the laws can't help you,
if the police can't help you,
where are you supposed to turn?
It's clear that I had to take matters
into my own hands.
[loud, thumping music plays]
[Gurvitz] I said, "Why don't we play
really loud music outside her room?"
And she didn't react to it at all.
She was like a statue.
We told her she wasn't allowed
to use the kitchen,
she wasn't allowed
to use the refrigerator.
She didn't seem to care
about any of these things.
-[indistinct chatter]
-[Gurvitz] I was freaking out,
to be honest, because our space with
my roommate and I felt extremely violated.
It was hard to sleep,
knowing that we weren't collecting rent.
It added an enormous amount
of financial pressure
and anxiety in my life.
I decided to try to handle the situation
in the most reasonably aggressive way
that I could handle it.
I got on her Facebook page
and she had about 4,000 followers or so,
and I just started messaging them
one after another.
I just said, "This is what's happening,
we can't get her out.
We don't know what to do."
And I got a lot of responses.
"She did this to us. It was terrible.
It took us six months to get her out."
And then I could not believe what she did.
It was just so shocking to me.
Ellie Mae tries
to get a temporary restraining order
against Jason.
I can't think of anything more terrifying
than being trapped in your own home
with not just a stranger,
but a sinister stranger.
Ellie Mae was claiming
that I was, you know, slandering her,
uh, by sending
all these Facebook messages.
I told Kessia,
I said, "This is absolutely ridiculous.
This case obviously is bullshit
because I told the truth."
We started doing research,
and we learned about this procedure
of getting cops to come to the house.
When the police are at the door,
all you have to do is tell them
that you wanna request
a civil harassment restraining order.
If they ask her to come outside
and she comes outside on her own volition,
she wouldn't be allowed to go back in.
But there's a caveat here:
She's not required by any law to come out.
And if she refuses to leave,
unfortunately, there's nothing else
you can do other than getting her evicted.
So at this point,
we need to create a situation
that makes Ellie angry enough
to call the police.
We hedged our bets
that by us taking away her keys,
she would call the police
and say that we broke the law,
and that's what she did.
She called the police.
-They came to my door
-[knocks on door]
and Ellie Mae was standing
over to my right outside on the street.
She was obviously very nervous,
she was biting her nails.
And I told them that I want to request
a civil harassment restraining order.
They looked at each other and they said,
"Sir, please let her in the apartment.
And we will handle the rest."
I waved over to Ellie, and I said,
"Please, you can come in now."
And she was so happy,
she was beaming
like she had just, you know,
won the lottery.
And just as she was walking
into the apartment,
one of the officers said,
"Miss, uh, Ellie Mae,
can you please come outside?
We just have one more question
to ask you."
The moment the police asked her
to come outside,
my roommate and I looked
at each other like,
"Okay, this is the moment of truth."
If she goes voluntarily,
then she's not allowed to go back in.
Are we going to get away with this?
Is this going to work?
One of the officers said,
"Miss, uh, Ellie Mae,
can you please come outside?"
And she turned around,
stepped across the threshold,
and started walking outside.
We knew that we were home free
at that point.
That was such a great moment.
They said, "Sorry, ma'am, you came out
because we requested you to come out,
and now you're not allowed to go back in."
And she just did not understand
what was happening.
They said," Ma'am, go get your stuff."
And, um, she didn't want to do it,
but Ellie Mae took all of her stuff
out of the house,
and then it was over.
When she finally was gone,
we saged our place
to shed this toxic energy
that she had left us with.
And eventually, we-we forgot about it.
We let it go.
And then I get a a call
from a person in London,
and he says,
"You were a victim of Ellie Mae McNulty.
We'd like to talk to you
for this article in Vanity Fair."
[Krauth] When the Vanity Fair article
dropped in 2025,
it really opened up the floodgates
when it comes to Ellie Mae McNulty.
[Bubbs] So after this Vanity Fair article
came out,
neighbors started talking about it,
and it was absolutely shocking
to find out all of the other stories
that were starting
to come out of other victims
that she'd victimized over the years
in Malibu.
[chattering]
I met Ellie Mae McNulty at a restaurant.
We decided
to, you know, rent out the guest house,
and that's when Ellie McNulty appeared.
And I first met Ellie Mae McNulty working
as a hostess at a local Malibu restaurant.
She was showing up at the security gates
and she was harassing the residents,
demanding to be let in.
She made an excuse
every time we asked her for a rent check.
The sanctuary of our home was
completely violated by this woman.
This was a means for her
to find new marks,
to find new victims,
and then she could prey on them.
She showed up
at our homeowners association meeting.
She tried to pretend with me
that she didn't speak English
and that she needed a key,
but she was a hustler.
She was relentless.
[victim 1] She pulled out her cell phone,
shoved it in my face, and said,
"Don't you realize
I'm here for the long run?
Are you stupid?"
I said, "Ellie, you're a parasite.
Get out of my house."
And I remember
she just started laughing and walked away.
When I learned about all these stories
of these other victims,
I could not believe it.
Honestly, what she did to us was terrible,
but I feel like what she did
to many of these other people
far surpasses [chuckles]
what she did to us.
My name is Dennis Block.
I am an eviction attorney.
My firm has literally evicted
Ellie Mae McNulty five separate occasions.
Ellie Mae is very well versed in the law,
and knows that once she gains entrance
to the premises,
that she'd be able to live there
for months without paying any rent.
One case where we ran up
against Ellie Mae McNulty,
she demanded that the case have a trial.
Obviously, the costs of the litigation are
greatly enlarged at that point,
and literally this landlord thought
it was in his best economic interest
to pay her to move,
and she left the premises
not paying any rent
and actually $3,000 richer.
Another time,
she met my client, Alden, on the beach.
She asked if she could stay in his unit
for just a few days.
My client, who had stage four melanoma,
invited her in.
Of course, she never moved out,
terrorized him, damaged the property.
Alden, he says he was confined
to the downstairs bedroom
of his apartment,
not able to roam his condo freely,
not even able to use the kitchen.
That's how scared he was
of Ellie Mae McNulty.
She literally changed the locks,
started tampering with the plumbing.
She then reached out
to my client's relatives
and said that she would move out,
but she would have to be paid $12,000,
which, of course, my client
and their relatives refused to pay.
He was so distraught,
he actually got hospitalized.
[Bubbs] Reading the Vanity Fair article,
that's when I learned
what had happened to Alden,
and it's just so heinous.
I mean, I can't stomach the fact
that she's preying on elderly people
or vulnerable people in our community,
and so I really wanted to make sure
that she would not continue
to prey upon people.
I made it my mission
along with other incredible neighbors
to really stop Ellie Mae from continuing
this horrible victimization of people.
[Krauth] The victims say Ellie is
a parasite and a constant problem,
and they wanted
to get her out of the area
and out of their lives.
[Bubbs] After Ellie Mae was exposed,
we all banded together as a community
to make sure she would leave.
-[victims speaking indistinctly]
-[victim 2] Get the hell out of our house.
[Krauth] If people weren't posting
their own personal stories about Ellie,
they were posting that Vanity Fair article
on apps like Nextdoor
to warn people about what was going on
and to try
to get her out of the community.
It literally spread like wildfire.
It's what everyone was talking about.
[Bubbs]
Nextdoor went crazy with this article.
We were able to expose her
to everyone in the community.
So we've been successful
in spreading the word,
and Ellie Mae has moved on.
[Krauth] This community has
banded together,
and they will remain together
in order to keep Ellie away.
They do not want her anywhere near Malibu.
And she's still out there.
There are whispers
that she's gone down to the valley.
On her social media, she continues
to post pictures from the sunsets there
on the West Coast.
My personal opinion is
that she's not going to ever stop
because this is
some sort of sick obsession.
[Krauth] Where are the consequences?
Where is someone saying,
"You were wrong
and you're going to be punished
for your behavior"?
[Bubbs] Ellie Mae was quite desperate
after having been exposed.
She was having counseling sessions
to repent and reform her image.
It's hard to victimize people
when they don't like you.
I know that she was going
into Westlake Village, Calabasas.
I've reached out to some businesses,
spread the word,
so that she doesn't do
the same thing there
that she did to our community.
I think this story really shows
that looks can be deceiving
and someone who seems harmless
and so friendly and so kind,
and open and welcoming
can be your worst nightmare.
[Block] Ellie Mae McNulty is a deadbeat,
and she just preys
upon innocent property owners.
I certainly hope
that I never cross [sighs]
her name in my files again,
but, uh, I'm prepared
to take her [chuckles] on
for the sixth time if that happens.
[Gurvitz] If you run into her,
if you see her at a party,
or you see her on the beach
walking her cat
run.
[Bubbs] It's like Ellie Mae made Malibu
her hunting ground.
She wants to live a lavish lifestyle,
but she doesn't wanna have
to pay for it.
I think what's sad about this is
you see someone taking over
and terrorizing other people's lives,
living in their homes,
trying to become someone else.
"More wonderful when angels are so angry."
Aw, this little angel.
He's not angry. He's helping me.
I think we're gonna end tonight.
[laughs]