{"id":10756,"date":"2019-05-30T12:40:44","date_gmt":"2019-05-30T19:40:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/?p=10756"},"modified":"2019-06-14T16:13:01","modified_gmt":"2019-06-14T23:13:01","slug":"what-to-do-at-an-open-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house\/","title":{"rendered":"Here&#8217;s What Visitors Actually Do at an Open House (And How You Can Prepare For Their Arrival)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Balloons? Check. Signs? Check. Invitations? Check. You\u2019re all set for the big event to begin and secure that offer on your home\u2026 but wait! You actually have no idea what to do at an open house to give your house a fighting chance at selling.<\/p>\n<p>Relax your game face, we\u2019ve got some news: Even if you\u2019re great at small talk and want to tell potential buyers all about how great your home is, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/open-house-tips-for-sellers\/\">sellers don\u2019t usually attend their own open houses<\/a>\u2014it\u2019s considered bad real estate practice. So what you need to do is leave and hand it over to your agent from here. (That is, if you still decide that an open house is worth it knowing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/are-open-houses-worth-it\/\">63% of top-selling agents don\u2019t recommend doing one.<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>However, just because you can\u2019t be there doesn\u2019t mean you\u2019re helpless. In fact, knowing what the typical open house guest will do, we\u2019ve outlined some of the top actions that you can take <i>before<\/i> the event to impress visitors and also protect your privacy.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_10760\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10760\" style=\"width: 700px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"700\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed.jpg\" class=\"attachment-content size-content\" alt=\"A bedroom that will be inspected at an open house.\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed.jpg 700w, https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed-64x37.jpg 64w, https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed-128x73.jpg 128w, https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed-192x110.jpg 192w, https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed-432x247.jpg 432w, https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/what-to-do-at-an-open-house-bed-500x286.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-10760\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: (Oliver Ash\/ Unsplash)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>Inspect every nook and cranny<\/h2>\n<p>Stuffing your dirty clothes, rock-\u2019n\u2019-roll CD collection, and sports trophies under the bed when Mom told you to \u201cclean your room\u201d didn\u2019t work back in the day and it won\u2019t work now. Open house guests will check your garage, bathroom cabinets, linen closets, and backyard shed to find out just how much storage your house has and decide: \u201cCan we work with this?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Considering <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/business\/personal-finance\/one-four-americans-has-clutter-problem-could-be-sitting-some-n766681\">1 in 4 Americans admit to having a \u201cclutter problem,\u201d<\/a> you can bet that potential buyers will swoon when they see that there\u2019s enough space to hang all their winter coats, a place to park the minivan (plus Sally\u2019s toy motor car), and\u2014bonus\u2014comfortably put away the crockpot in the actual kitchen. That\u2019ll be hard for them to gauge if your countertops are littered with mail and you have a three-stall garage but can\u2019t house a single car.<\/p>\n<h4>Seller\u2019s strategy: Purge and organize drawers, cabinets, closets, the attic, the garage, and basement<\/h4>\n<p>Do a serious purge as soon as you decide to sell your house. Jump on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/marie-kondo-netflix\/\">KonMari bandwagon<\/a> by starting with one closet or type of item (like the Tupperware drawer) and making your way around your home, see <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/guide-to-getting-your-house-ready-to-sell\/\">what does and does not \u201cspark joy\u201d<\/a> or is an essential.<\/p>\n<p>If you do discover a long forgotten closet full of stuff that you can\u2019t part with, consider putting it in storage until you are ready to move, so buyers don\u2019t have to see it. Closets and drawers don\u2019t need to be empty, they just need to be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/how-to-organize-a-closet\/\">neat and organized<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You\u2019re all set for the big event to begin, but you have no idea what to do at an open house to give your house a fighting chance at selling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":10759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[321,244],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-attract-buyers","category-open-houses"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.0 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ 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