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Open Home Etiquette: A Seller's Guide for Brisbane

What you do in the hours before buyers arrive, and what you avoid doing while they are there, has a measurable effect on your result. Here is what actually matters.

Open homes in Brisbane's inner east tend to be competitive affairs, particularly on a Saturday morning when three or four comparable listings are all running within a kilometre of each other. Buyers attend multiple inspections in one session. They make notes, take photos, and compare properties that same afternoon. The ones that stay in their memory are not always the ones with the highest ceilings or the freshest renovation. They are the ones that felt settled, well cared for, and easy to picture living in. That impression is largely within a seller's control.

The following guide covers what to do before, during, and after each open home, and how to use what buyers tell your agent to make each subsequent inspection more effective.

Before the open: the morning checklist

The evening before is the best time to do the heavy lifting. Dishes cleaned and put away, surfaces cleared, laundry off the line or hidden, bins emptied. Leave the morning for final touches rather than a scramble. Buyers who arrive at 10:02am on a Saturday see everything that is still sitting on the kitchen counter at 9:55am.

On the morning itself, work through the following:

Natural light first. Open every curtain and blind in the house. Brisbane homes, especially the Queenslanders and postwar timber houses that dominate suburbs like Norman Park, Hawthorne and Camp Hill, read completely differently with full natural light. A dark interior suggests damp, age, and neglect even when none of those things are true. Open the skylights if you have them. If a room has poor natural light, turn the lamps on.

Temperature. In Brisbane's summer months, air conditioning the property before buyers arrive is important. A hot house is an uncomfortable house, and buyers move through quickly when they are uncomfortable. Set the air conditioning to a reasonable temperature an hour before the open so the house feels genuinely cool when the first buyers walk in, not just beginning to cool. In winter, the reverse applies: no buyer should feel a cold draught in the entry.

Fragrance, not fragrance products. Fresh flowers in the kitchen or living area are excellent. Coffee brewing is a reliable positive. Scented candles and plug-in diffusers divide buyers and often read as attempts to mask something. If the house smells clean and neutral, do not add to it. If it does not, the underlying issue needs addressing before the campaign begins.

Garden and front approach. In inner Brisbane, where properties are often elevated and the front approach involves stairs or a path, the condition of that entry sequence matters. Sweep the path, clean the stairs, remove the potted plant that died three weeks ago. The front gate, the letterbox, and the front door are all part of the first impression. If the front door needs a coat of paint, paint it before the campaign. If the front fence is leaning, straighten it.

Inside the garage. Buyers look. If the garage is full of the contents of three house moves, they draw conclusions about storage and how the property has been cared for. You do not need to empty the garage completely, but it should read as usable space, not a storage unit.

Pets and valuables

Pets should not be in the property during an open home. This is not a preference; it is a practical rule. Buyers with allergies, buyers who are nervous around animals, and buyers who simply do not want dog hair on their trousers are all part of your buyer pool. A dog locked in a bedroom or a cat underfoot is a distraction from the property. Organise for pets to be off-site for the duration of the inspection, whether that means a walk, a visit to a neighbour, or a trip to a boarding facility for a day.

Cat litter trays and dog bowls should be removed or placed well out of sight, and the area cleaned. The smell of a litter tray in a bathroom is one of the most reliable ways to damage an otherwise positive inspection experience.

Valuables including jewellery, cash, prescription medications, personal documents, and small electronics should be removed before every open home. Your agent cannot monitor every buyer in every room simultaneously. This is not a reflection on the buyers attending your open home; it is simply a sensible precaution that every selling agent should recommend.

Neighbours

Your neighbours can help your sale or complicate it, and a brief conversation before your campaign begins costs nothing. Let them know you are selling, when your open homes are scheduled, and that you would appreciate any consideration during inspection times. Most neighbours are co-operative. Occasionally they are not, and it is better to know that before your first open home than to have buyers inspecting next to a leaf blower at full throttle.

If you share a fence or driveway with neighbours who have a dog that barks at strangers, or whose front yard is in noticeably poor condition relative to your own, these are worth a polite conversation. You cannot control your neighbours' properties, but awareness of the issue allows your agent to manage it in the way they present the surrounding area to buyers.

During the open: what sellers should not do

The clearest guidance here is simple: do not be present during your own open home. Buyers feel uncomfortable inspecting in front of the current owner. They moderate what they say, they move more quickly, they feel less able to open doors and explore cupboards. The inspection becomes shorter and less thorough, which means buyers carry less conviction into their decision. A buyer who has spent 20 minutes thoroughly inspecting a home and talking openly with the agent is in a very different position to one who spent 10 minutes being watched by the vendor.

If your circumstances mean you cannot leave, speak to your agent about how to handle it. The worst version is a seller who follows buyers from room to room and volunteers information without being asked. Buyers interpret this as desperation, as an attempt to head off questions about problems, or simply as awkward. None of those impressions help your negotiation.

Do not have family members at the property unless they are also leaving. The same principle applies.

What agents look for in buyer feedback

After each open home, your agent should debrief you on buyer numbers, the quality of enquiry, and any consistent themes in the feedback they heard. Pay close attention to what is repeated across multiple buyers, because that is the signal that is worth acting on.

Buyer feedback typically falls into a few categories. Price feedback ("it's a bit above what we were expecting for this area") is the most common, and while it should inform your pricing strategy, it should not be taken literally. Buyers are not always disclosing their true ceiling, and agents should be interpreting the feedback pattern across all buyers rather than any single comment.

Presentation feedback ("the backyard felt a bit small" or "the main bedroom needed more light") is often actionable. If three separate buyers mention the same thing, it is worth discussing with your agent whether there is a cost-effective way to address it before the next open. Sometimes it cannot be fixed. Sometimes a $200 change makes a meaningful difference.

Condition concerns ("we noticed a crack above the doorframe" or "is the roof newer?") signal buyers who are doing their due diligence. Your agent should have clear answers to these questions and, where relevant, documentation to hand over: building reports, pool safety certificates, and receipts for recent work all help buyers feel that concerns are already known and managed.

Between opens: what to act on and what to ignore

Not every piece of buyer feedback deserves a response. Buyers making unrealistic requests or flagging preferences that reflect their own taste ("I'd remove the pool") are not telling you something actionable. Your agent should help you distinguish between feedback that reflects genuine market sentiment and feedback that reflects a single buyer's preferences.

What is worth acting on between opens: anything that reduces buyer conviction or gives buyers a reason to hold off making an offer. A dripping tap, a broken flysceen, a light fitting that does not work, a stain on the carpet near the entry. These are inexpensive to address and their presence in a property during an open home suggests to buyers that there may be more issues they have not yet seen. Their absence does the opposite.

After three or four opens, if enquiry has been strong but offers have not materialised, the more likely issue is pricing rather than presentation. This is the conversation to have with your agent, and it requires honesty about what comparable sales in the current market are actually telling you.