Denoora returned home from holiday. When she opened the door, panic set in.

Triple check the oven is off, the doors are locked, and that someone will collect our mail — these are just some of the precautions we take to ensure our homes stay safe in our absence.

But for Denoora Lyu, a 22-year-old University of Sydney student, fear became reality when she and her partner, William Qu, returned from a holiday to find a half-naked stranger living in her home.

Back in February, Lyu returned to her apartment, where she was met with a stranger, per 7News.

He was shirtless, bushy-bearded and unfazed.

The intruder being apprehended. Image: Denoora Lyu/7NEWS.com.au.

Fear and shock took over.

"I thought I'd gone to the wrong place at first," Lyu told 7NEWS.

But her eyes weren't playing tricks on her — there really was an intruder standing in her living room.

"I felt really shaken. There was a complete stranger standing in my home, and he wasn't even wearing a shirt. It just didn't seem normal," she said.

"I kept thinking, 'What if he had a knife?' I was scared of what he might do."

But what happened next set the tone for a bizarre turn of events.

There was no big scuffle. There was no huge reaction from the intruder. In fact, everything was calm.

As the couple questioned the intruder — who has since been identified as 30-year-old Dylan Patrick Yelkovan — the man casually packed up his belongings, which had been strewn around the two-bedroom apartment.

Then, he exited via the balcony.

Yelkovan was soon apprehended by police, who arrested him. The young couple were left to reckon with the unsettling scene he left behind.

Before departing for their holiday, Lyu and her boyfriend had packed up all of their belongings into boxes — they'd been preparing to move into a new home after their return.

While they were gone, however, Yelkovan had helped himself to the contents of the boxes, rifling through the contents of each box and using whatever suited him.

He wore Qu's clothes and left them stained with faeces. He unpacked a desktop computer and set it up.

All of their belongings had been used and soiled by the intruder. Image: Denoora Lyu/7NEWS.com.au.

"He unpacked every single box and used everything inside, including the desktop computer, which hadn't even been set up at the time," Lyu said. He'd even brought out a wine decanter, which he was using as a vase.

"I've seen stories about break-ins like this before, but when it actually happens to you, it's still really shocking," she added.

Yelkovan also racked up charges on a bank card, with the transaction history suggesting that he was in Lyu's apartment for around a week. While the bank refunded the stolen money, the invasion still came at a great cost — the couple had to stay at a hotel for a week while the apartment was professionally cleaned, which cost them $2,000.

NSW Police confirmed to 7NEWS that Yelkovan pleaded guilty to the charges, and was sentenced to nine months imprisonment. However, the sentence was enforced as an Intensive Correction Order (ICO), which means that rather than jail time, he must adhere to strict supervisions, drug abstinence and location restrictions.

Feature image: Getty Images.