Extra-sensory perception is a reality for Melbourne-based psychic researcher Drew Sinton.

After more than a decade in the field, the haunted-house investigator has a sixth sense - he knows if a house is haunted or if he is "being taken for a ride ".

He investigated a house in which a man in a black robe and a hat was often seen, and was on the way to another when a woman stopped him and told him about another man in black she had seen.

"She didn't know I was already investigating a man in black," Mr Sinton said.

"It was as if she'd read my mind, for I was subconsciously thinking about the man in black at the last house I'd been to.

"The woman said she'd woken late one night to find the room temperature dropping dramatically and a robed man in black standing by her bed.

"She knew he'd come to take her husband who lay frozen beside her.

But she put up a fight and the man left without her husband.

"So many people tell me about this man, it's as if he sends them to me.

I've got so much material now I'm writing a book about him.

"I don't really know if he's the Grim Reaper, a demonic or malevolent figure or just a silent observer. "