Open house signs that get people in the door

An open house lives or dies on Saturday morning traffic, and most of that traffic is people who were driving somewhere else. Signs are how you catch them. Here is what we have learned from agents who run a lot of them.

How many signs, and where

Start at the house and drive away from it toward the busiest road nearby. Every time you turn, that corner needs a sign pointing the other way. Most homes in a subdivision need three or four turns; a home on a through street may need one.

Situation	Signs	Where
On a main road	2	One each way, 200 ft out
One turn off a main road	3 to 4	Both directions at the turn, plus the house
Deep in a subdivision	6 to 8	Every turn, both approaches to the entrance

Count them on the way in and again on the way out. A sign that blew over at 11 am is a sign that stopped working at 11 am.

What goes on the sign

Three things: the words Open House, an arrow, and the hours. Your name and photo are for the sign at the house, not the directionals; at driving speed nobody reads a name, and the arrow is what they need.

• "Open House" in letters at least 4 inches tall
• One arrow, pointed the right way for that corner
• The hours, so a 3 pm driver knows they missed it
• A QR code on the sign at the house only, sized for a phone at 6 feet¹

At the house

The sign at the house does the rest of the work: your name, your brokerage, your phone, the Equal Housing Opportunity mark, and a QR code that opens the sign-in page so visitors can register from the sidewalk.

The two quiet mistakes

Setting up too late. The first visitors often arrive fifteen minutes early, and a couple who cannot find the house will not circle twice. Signs go out the night before where that is allowed, or an hour early where it is not.

Reusing a sign with old hours. A sign that says 1 to 4 on a 12 to 3 open house sends people away at 3:30 and makes the 12:00 crowd think they are early. Print riders with the hours, or leave the hours off the directionals and put them only on the sign at the house.

What to print

A corrugated plastic sign lasts through a season of open houses; the 4 mm stock is fine for directionals and the 10 mm holds up in wind. Print the arrow signs in pairs, left and right, so any corner is covered. Prosperk prints yard signs at 18 × 24 and 24 × 18 with your brand kit already on them.

1. A QR code needs to be about an inch across for every 10 feet of reading distance. On a yard sign, 3 inches is comfortable. ↩