If you were buying a family home, how would you want the family room to look?

[strawberrycornetto]

We have just put our house on the market and I am trying to sort/tidy/make it look as good as possible for viewings.

It is a large house, so we have a living room, a dining room and then also a large family room which is open plan into the kitchen/breakfast room.

The family room has all the toys in it. DH seems to think they should all be hidden away for viewings but I am not sure. We have two children under 5 and its the kind of house that will sell to a family I would have thought. Would you be put off if you saw toys out (but tidy, obviously, not all over the floor . I have clear plastic storage boxes, would seeing them be a real turn off?

The other living room is a grown up room, so that has no toys in it and is generally really smart.

Would really appreciate MN's view (and any other thoughts on what you would be looking for if you were house hunting for a big family home)!

A few tidy toys is fine. But if it looks like a playroom, that could be defining the space too much. People might want it as a gardenroom/lounge/even study area. We've just bought a big house and we don't have young children/lots of toys.

I would make it as bland as possible for the potential buyer to apply their own imagination on how they want to use the space, i.e. best remove most of the toys.

So long as it is tidy, an th boxes don't make it looked cramped or too busy, then some toy boxes are fine.

Are there loads in there? You could store some elsewhere and just have 1 or 2 of the nicer boxes on show during viewings.

The most important thing to do (in any room of the house) is to get absolutely everything that does not need to be on the floor off the floor. The more floor area the eye can see, the bigger the space seems.

I think people hope to be able to see clearly exactly what a room is used for and they prefer not to see two different functions in the same room.

I'd want to see the floor, but wouldn't mind some toys being on the floor/ in clear boxes stacked against wall. Mainly I'd want to get the impression the room was loved rather than the dumping ground for all the kids stuff iykwim.

That's really helpful. Perhpas DH is right after all . Pollytechnique, you make an interesting point, I had been assuming a family but its true I shouldnt't narrow the market.

Am off to tidy up more toys!!

Hope you get a really good, reliable buyer!

Having just been round the most astonishing number of houses looking for something to buy, I can say that you should get rid of as many of the toys as possible. It really does make it hard to look at the house properly with loads of toys. And I rather embarassingly found myself making ridiculous judgements about people that I knew were crazy and silly, but nonetheless did affect my view of how buying a house from them would be.

It's not fair. It's not rational. But it's there. The more neutral you can go, the more likely you are to do well.

Well I have de-toyed the family room. DCs will not be pleased!! I have ended up with two small boxes on top of our wooden toy chest. There are also books and toys put away on a book shelf and a couple of ride on toys under the table. But the room is pretty large - I think its about 18ft square, so it still looks very spacious I think. We will see what feedback we get I guess!