- Write the address for a stranger: street, floor, entrance, bell, parking and the nearest stop. A postcode is not directions.
- Decide between an open house with hours and a fixed start, then word the one you are having.
- "No gifts" only works with an alternative: a plant, a bottle to open that night, a recipe, or genuinely nothing.
- Say the awkward practicalities on the invitation, not at the door — shoes off, a small flat, six chairs, a cat that bolts.
- An open house still needs numbers. A reply-by date turns twenty maybes into a shopping list.
What a housewarming invitation must say
Most of your guests are navigating to somewhere they have never been, on an evening when you are cooking and not answering the phone. If the invitation carries the list below, nobody ends up outside the wrong door.
- Who is inviting, and whether that is one of you or the household.
- The new address in full, written as a stranger would need it.
- How to get in: floor, entrance, bell name, lift or stairs.
- The hours: an open house with a start and an end, or a single start time.
- What there is to eat and drink, in one line.
- Gifts: whether you want any, and what instead.
- Anything to know before arriving — shoes off, no lift, a cat indoors, where to park.
- How to reply, and by when.
The address, written so a stranger can find it
You know the way in, which is the problem. The friends who came to the old flat twenty times are the ones most likely to try the wrong entrance, and the ones who drive decide whether to drive at all from what you say about parking.
Write it as three short lines: where the building is, how to get into it, how to get to it. A digital invitation has room for all of it — a map link, a photo of the front door, and the buzzer name that is not your name.
14 Rue Verte, third floor, left-hand door. Courtyard entrance, bell marked Nowak.
Kastanienallee 12, Berlin. Second floor, no lift, and ring twice — once gets you our neighbour.
Our new address is 9 Zeeburgerdijk, Amsterdam. Tram 14 to Pontanusstraat, then two minutes on foot.
The yellow house at the end of the lane, past the postbox. If you reach the church you have gone too far.
| Detail | Why a guest needs it | Line to copy |
|---|---|---|
| Floor and door | Half the buzzers in Europe carry the wrong name | Third floor, left-hand door — the bell still says Nowak. |
| Entrance | New buildings have three doors and one that opens | Use the courtyard entrance; the door on the square is offices. |
| Bell or buzzer | A stranger left outside at nine goes home | Buzz flat 14 and keep pressing; it sticks. |
| Parking | It decides whether people drive at all | Free on the street after 6pm, or the car park behind the church. |
| Nearest stop | Guests look it up anyway, and get it wrong | Ten minutes from Oost station, or tram 14 to the corner. |
| Stairs and lift | Some guests cannot do four flights, and will not say so | Second floor, no lift — tell us and we'll come down. |
Open house, or a fixed start
Most housewarmings are open houses, for a good reason: a flat that cannot hold thirty people at once can hold thirty across six hours, and a guest with children can come for forty minutes without apologising.
A fixed start is a different event. If you are sitting down to eat, give a time and mean it. An open house advertised with a single hour is not an open house: everyone arrives at that hour, and the six-hour plan becomes a crush at eight.
Open house on Sunday 12 April, from midday until six. Come when it suits you and stay as long as you like.
We'll be at home from two until eight on the 12th. Drop in at any point.
The door is open from midday. If you're bringing children, the early hours are the calmer ones.
Drinks from 8pm on Saturday, and the flat will be full by nine.
This one has a start time and a table: housewarming dinner, 7.30 for 8.
Formal wording
The formal form is the At Home card, worth knowing because it is short and still works: the hosts' names, the words "At Home", the date, the hours, and the address last. No verbs, nothing about the move.
Anna and Piotr Nowak · At Home · Sunday the twelfth of April · four until seven o'clock · 14 Rue Verte, Ghent
Mr and Mrs Nils Hagen request the pleasure of your company at a housewarming on Saturday, the eighteenth of April, at seven o'clock.
Ida Bergstrom and Ruben Maes have moved to 12 Kastanienallee and would be glad to see you there.
Drinks and a light supper will be served from six until nine o'clock.
Kindly reply by the fourth of April.
Modern wording
The modern register is a sentence about the move and then the facts. Guests do not need the story of the search, the survey or the removal van; they need to know that you live somewhere new and that they are wanted in it.
We've moved. Come and see the place. Open house on Sunday 12 April, midday until six.
New flat, new address, same people. Drop in on Sunday afternoon.
We finally have a door of our own. 14 Rue Verte, Saturday from three.
Housewarming at ours: Saturday 18 April, from seven. Nothing formal, plenty to eat.
Sofia and Luca are at home on the 12th from two, and would like you to be the first people in the new kitchen.
We're in. The boxes are not. Come anyway.
Playful wording
A housewarming takes a joke better than most invitations, because everyone knows what the first month in a new place looks like. Keep the joke in the first line and the address unimprovised.
We have unpacked nine boxes and one of them was glasses. Come round on Sunday.
New keys, no curtains, one enormous sofa. Sunday from midday.
Come and see the flat while it is still tidy. This window is short.
The kettle works and the oven has opinions. Housewarming on Saturday, from seven.
Three flights of stairs, a lift that has never worked, and a very good view. Sunday, midday until six.
Food, drink, and the gift question
Say what the food is in one line, because guests are deciding whether to eat first. Drinks and something to pick at is the honest default for an open house; a proper dinner needs a fixed start and a table.
"No gifts" alone is heard as good manners rather than as an instruction — people arrive with wine because they cannot arrive with nothing. Name the thing you want instead: a plant for a flat with one window, a bottle to open that evening, a recipe for a cupboard you are restocking.
There'll be soup, bread and cheese all afternoon. Come hungry or come fed; both work.
Drinks and snacks from six — it isn't dinner, so eat something first.
This one is dinner: one table, eight of us, sitting down at eight.
If you'd like to bring something to eat, tell us when you reply so it isn't all bread.
Bring nothing. Genuinely — we have just moved and there is nowhere to put it.
No gifts, please. If you can't help yourself, a plant: the flat has one window and needs the company.
Instead of a present, bring a bottle you actually like and we'll open it that night.
Write your best weeknight recipe on a card and leave it in the bowl by the door. We are starting again from an empty cupboard.
We are short of glasses rather than of things, if you happen to own a spare.
Shoes off, a small flat, and the neighbours
The practical lines are the ones people leave off out of embarrassment and then have to say at the door, where they land far worse. New floors, four flights, six chairs for twenty people: written on the invitation with a reason attached, none of it is rude.
Children and pets need a straight answer either way, and a reason if the answer is no. Neighbours are worth a line of their own: say when the music stops, or invite them, which is the cheapest insurance available to anyone who has just moved in.
New floors, so shoes off at the door — thick socks encouraged.
It is a small flat: six chairs, about twenty of us, and most of the evening spent standing.
Children very welcome, especially before four — there's a garden and a box of bricks.
This one is grown-ups only. The flat is small and the stairs are steep.
We have a cat who bolts, so please close the door behind you.
The dog is friendly and will meet you at the door. Say if that is not your idea of a good evening.
Music stops at eleven, because we would like the neighbours to keep speaking to us.
The neighbours are invited too, which is either generous or strategic.
A flat-warming, a first home, a move abroad, a house finished at last
Four housewarmings come up often enough to have their own wording. A flat-warming is about space and neighbours, so be honest about both. A first home is a milestone worth saying plainly, and the one occasion where people genuinely want to give you something.
A move abroad is a housewarming and a goodbye at once: give a weekend rather than an evening, and say what there is to sleep on. A house finished after building work has its story built in — fourteen months of dust is why the invitation is a year late.
We've bought a flat, which still sounds like something other people do. Come and see it on the 18th.
First home, first housewarming, and the first time we've had enough chairs. Sunday from two.
We're in Valencia now, so this is a housewarming and a goodbye at once. Our door is open the weekend of 12 to 14 June.
Come for the weekend rather than the evening — the spare room is made up and there's a sofa for one more.
The builders left on Friday. After fourteen months, come and see what we did.
The reply line: an open house still needs numbers
An open house feels like the one event that does not need replies, and it is the one where the numbers hurt most: twelve people and sixty are the same invitation and a different shopping list.
Set the date a few days before you shop, and say what it is for — people answer a reason better than a deadline. If you are inviting new neighbours, family abroad and old friends at once, one link beats three group chats: the reply is a tap in a browser with no app and no account, and it closes on your date. The page reads in nine languages.
Let us know by 9 April if you're coming, and roughly when — it decides how much bread we buy.
Reply with numbers, please: an open house is still a shopping list.
RSVP by 9 April. After that we stop counting and start cooking.
If you can only come for half an hour, come for half an hour — but tell us, so there's something left when you arrive.
Reply on the invitation; there's a box for how many of you there are, and one for anything you don't eat.
Wording mistakes at housewarmings
- The address given as a postcode, on the assumption that everyone navigates the way you do.
- No floor and no bell name, so a guest stands in the rain at a door with six buzzers.
- An open house advertised with a single start time, so everyone arrives in the same ten minutes.
- Hours with a start and no end, so the last four guests are still there at two.
- "No gifts" with no alternative, so half the guests bring wine and feel awkward about it.
- A gift list for a house, which reads as an invoice.
- Shoes off announced at the door instead of on the invitation.
- Nothing said about food, so guests eat before they come and what you made goes uneaten.
- Children not mentioned either way, so every parent has to ask privately.
- No reply date for an open house, so you buy for forty and twelve people come.
FAQ
- How do you word a housewarming invitation?
- Say who is inviting, that it is a housewarming, the date and the hours, and the new address written for someone who has never been. Then answer the three things guests ask: food, gifts, and anything to know before arriving.
- How do you write the address on a housewarming invitation?
- As three lines rather than one: where the building is, how to get into it, and how to get to it — floor, entrance, bell name, parking, nearest stop. "Third floor, left-hand door, the bell still says Nowak" saves more calls than anything else on the card.
- What is an open house, and how do you word one?
- An open house gives hours instead of a start: "Open house on Sunday 12 April, from midday until six. Come when it suits you and stay as long as you like." Give an end as well as a beginning.
- How do you say no gifts on a housewarming invitation?
- By offering something instead, because "no gifts" alone is heard as politeness. "No gifts, please. If you can't help yourself, a plant — the flat has one window and needs the company" gives people the small thing they wanted to arrive with.
- What do you say about food at a housewarming?
- One line, so guests know whether to eat first. "Drinks and snacks from six, it isn't dinner" is the honest version; "soup, bread and cheese all afternoon" is the open-house version.
- How do you ask guests to take their shoes off?
- On the invitation, with the reason attached: "New floors, so shoes off at the door — thick socks encouraged." Said in advance it is a practical note; said at the door it is an ambush.
- Do you need RSVPs for an open house?
- Yes, for the same reason as any other event: twelve people and sixty cost different amounts. Ask for a yes, a rough time and how many are coming, with a date a few days before you shop.
- How far in advance do you send a housewarming invitation?
- Two to three weeks is enough for an afternoon or an evening at home. Send it further ahead if guests are travelling — a move abroad wants a weekend and about six weeks' notice.