How to Feel at Home in Your New Apartment Quickly

What can you do to make your new apartment really feel like home?

So you’ve done it — found a new apartment, signed the lease, and moved in. Problem is, your new apartment doesn’t quite feel like home yet. Fortunately, with a little effort, you can get comfortable and minimize those foreign feelings fast.

Here are some steps you can take to settle into your new apartment so that you feel at home more quickly.

Make the bed. 
Odds are that at the end of moving day, you’ll feel exhausted. Get your bed set up with your favorite sheets and your pillow in its proper place. If it makes you more comfortable, add your night table, reading lamp, and any books or photographs. You may also want to make sure the bedroom is free of boxes before you go to bed, so you don’t have the obvious reminder of more unpacking to do as you’re drifting off to sleep or waking up the next day.

Set up your bathroom and kitchen. 
After you sleep, you’ll probably want to shower and make yourself a decent breakfast or cup of coffee. If you have a priority box, go ahead and unpack it. If not, concentrate on the bathroom and kitchen until you’ve unpacked enough boxes to do what you need to do to feel like yourself.

Clear pathways.  
Having to step over boxes can make moving even more stressful and irritating. If you weren’t able to leave space when you were unloading boxes, concentrate on unpacking so that you can clear paths and begin to move freely from room to room.

Don’t pack away precious items. 
Do you have anything that functions as the adult equivalent of a security blanket? This may be photographs of loved ones, your personal bulletin board or a folder full of souvenirs. Whatever it is, don’t put it in a box on the moving truck. Keep it with you so it can be one of the first things you lovingly feature in your new home.

Use familiar, comforting smells. 
If you’ve just moved, you may not be quite ready to put pictures or artwork on the walls. A faster way to make yourself comfortable is to introduce a favorite smell into your new apartment, whether it’s coffee, pastries from your favorite bakery, or a candle, fragrance diffuser, or incense blend.

Get ready to have friends over. 
One frequent recommendation is to go ahead and decide on the date of your housewarming party before you even move. That way, you won’t be tempted to put it — and the unpacking it requires — off. You’ll feel much more at home after you’ve been able to host a gathering of your favorite people in your new space.

Think about what makes your new apartment special.
Once you’ve gotten over the mental hurdle of accepting that your new apartment is now home, start thinking about what you can do that you might not have taken the time to do at your old place. Could the apartment use some nice curtains? Can you put your TV or home office in a different place? Does the kitchen give you enough room to experiment with cooking? With these activities, you start to claim ownership of your new space.

Photo Credit: Shutterstock / Subbotina Anna