Ideas for decorating your home for an open house
Selling your home is daunting; saying goodbye to the place that holds your memories.
Though you’ll be sad to see the house go, soon others will be imagining their very own life within those walls. They don’t want a reminder of the home that it used to be – your home.
They want it to look like an opportunity. A future. Not your past.
How do you stage the house to feel homely? Moreover, how do you reduce the feeling it’s your home yet show them it could be a home, their home?
Depersonalising the house, while keeping it homely
Potential buyers walk in, take a look around and feel uncomfortable. Why? It feels like they are in a strangers’ home, intruding.
It’ll be difficult for them to imagine it as their own. Especially, if there are constant reminders of your previous life within those walls.
To get around this, take down family photos and personal items laying around.
But, keep a few reminders that this house can be a beautiful home too.
How?
- Spreading a (clean) throw over the sofa
- Keeping your towels (again, clean) on the towel rack
- Leaving fresh flowers in the kitchen
These are all simple ways you can keep the ‘homeliness’ of the house, without it feeling like your home.
You can keep some photos up – but by some, we mean no more than two photos per room. Unless they’re not of your memories.
For example, canvas prints from Pixa Prints. A picture of the garden in the summer looking beautiful would be fit for this purpose.
Offering food and drinks
To entice potential buyers, bake warm cookies. Let the smell subconsciously make them feel at home on a Sunday morning.
Offer them out, let them sit on the sofa with a cup of tea and a handful of cookies. Although, not everyone will feel comfortable enough to, which is understandable.
But the idea is that seeing people doing everyday things will resonate with them. It will show them the house isn’t an empty property, it’s a place they could be relaxing in – should they buy it.
Plus, it’s the best surprise when you walk into the third open house you’ve been to today and see cookies!
Giving them the chance to sit and feel comfortable gives them a positive emotion to attach to the house.
Before anyone says cookies and tea aren’t decorations, in a sense they are. They’re decorating the idea a potential buyer will form of the house.
What about the garden?
Of course, cut the grass. Plant new, pretty flowers and bushes to brighten it up. You could even hang tea-lights around for later viewings.
If you’ve got a small garden, hanging mirrors around will create the illusion of a larger space. You can buy cheap stick on mirrors and tiles to put on the outside brick walls.
Do you have any more ideas?
Tell us how you’ve decorated your house for previous open houses and what you believe worked best.
You May Also Enjoy
5 Practical Examples: This is How AI is Changing Real Estate
Overheating moves up the housing agenda
Annual house price growth slows in June
Nationwide House Price Index May 2026
Breaking Property News 1/7/26