12 Creative Tips for Planning a Haunted House

Plan a spooky experience for all ages to enjoy

Co-authored by Marissa Fidler and Elaine Heredia, BA

Last Updated: October 1, 2025 Fact Checked

Transforming your home into a haunted house is the perfect way to celebrate Halloween! It's also a creative way to get your friends and family together and give them a chillingly fun experience they'll never forget. Come with us to learn how to make a haunted house, from planning a haunted path to decorating with props to planning spooky activities.

How to Make a DIY Haunted House

Plan an age-appropriate experience.
Plot out the haunted path you want guests to stick to.
Decide on a theme (like "Mad Scientist's Lab" or "Insane Asylum").
Ask friends to guide activities and jump-scare guests.
Create an eerie effect with low lighting.
Use special spooky effects like strobe lights or a fog machine.

1

Plan an age-appropriate experience.

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Think about who will be following your haunted path. Will the audience be filled with little kids or older adults? This will determine your theme and the scariness level of your haunted house. For example, if the haunted house will mainly be visited by adults, it's okay to pump up the gore and jump scares. If kids will be visiting, aim for a fun, spooky vibe instead of terrifying.
- Give a prize to the children who reach the end of your haunted house path, like candy or a party favor.

2

Plot out your haunted path.

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Decide where you want your guests to go in your home. Will your guests enter the haunted house through the front or back door? Will you utilize all the rooms in the house, or just a few key rooms and hallways? The path through your haunted house can be as long or short as your space allows, so use your imagination!
- Direct guests to certain parts of your house (and keep them out of others) by building fake walls with cardboard boxes or hanging fabric.
- Stretch yellow "Caution" tape over doorways you don't want anyone to enter, as if the room beyond is a crime scene.
- Print maps of the path to help your guests find their way. These also make great party favors!
- Label the exits and bathrooms clearly, so guests can leave or use the toilet whenever they need.

3

Come up with a theme or story.

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The more specific your haunted house is, the more entertaining it will be. Decide if you want a traditional haunted house with ghosts or something unique, like an abandoned insane asylum or a pirate's cove. Whatever theme you choose will guide you as you decorate.
- To create an authentic haunted house experience, write a scary story about why the house is haunted. For example, the house could be haunted by a family that was brutally murdered in the basement. Tell this chilling tale to your guests as they enter to set the mood.
- Plan a Halloween costume for yourself that matches your chosen theme. For example, if your haunted house is Harry Potter-themed, dress up as a wizard!

4

Decorate with scary props.

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Craft or buy props appropriate for your guests' age. If you're going for a fun, child-friendly theme, avoid gore and try to keep the Halloween decorations fun or only mildly scary. For example, decorate with plastic bats, cloth ghosts, and posters showing cartoonish monsters (like a green Frankenstein's Monster). For a scarier adult theme, use decorations such as fake blood, skulls, heads in a jar, or gory "dead bodies" made with plastic or fabric dummies.
- Don't forget to decorate the outside of your home, too! For example, if you have steps leading up to your front door, seasonal decor expert Marissa Fidler suggests placing fake bones "in between pumpkins… and whatever else you may have on your steps… [to give it] an instant spooky Halloween vibe."^{[1]
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5

Create an eerie atmosphere with lighting.

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Avoid using a lot of lights in your haunted house, or guests will be too relaxed. If it's dark, they'll feel tense and have a better time. Just make sure to give your guests enough light to walk through the house safely without bumping into or tripping over anything. Here are some creative ways to use lighting to amp up the haunted atmosphere:
- Put your guests in a very dark room and give them flashlights to try to find their way out.
- Replace your lamps with dim, green bulbs around the house.
- Drape your lamps with fake cobwebs and tape fake bats to lamp shades
- Light a spotlight under a spider web or fake creepy insect to create spooky shadows on the wall.

6

Use creative special effects.

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These special effects will help your visitors feel deliciously tense and frightened at every turn. Fog machines and strobe lights are also classic haunted house special effects that will enhance your house's spooky vibe.^{[2]
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7

Play spooky sounds and music.

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The sounds in the haunted house will keep your guests on their toes. The trick to playing spooky noises is to time them perfectly and not use them too often, or your guests won't be surprised. Here are some tricks to creating some scary sounds:^{[3]
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- Play a different spooky sound in every room. One room can have the sound of a chainsaw, while another can have the sound of a woman screaming.
- Ask your helpers to scamper from one side of an empty room to another to make eerie footstep sounds.
- Put on a soundtrack made up of soft, creepy music.
- Select key moments to keep the house silent so your guests will be even more startled by the next sound.

8

Add some gore.

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Gore is often overdone, but it can be effective if used properly. For example, place a "victim" (i.e., a dummy or a friend who's helping you) of a "murder" next to a pool of blood. Alternatively, use the red, purple, and green makeup from a bruise kit to cover the "victim" to make them look as if they have a horrible infection. You can also put a bloody brain out on a table or near a "victim" to make it look like it was removed from their skull.
- Create bloody visual effects by painting fake blood on your mirrors or dripping red candle wax over mirrors or white surfaces.

9

Enlist the help of spooky friends.

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Make your haunted house come alive by involving your partners in crime. Not only will your friends be able to help you decorate, but they can also interact and entertain your guests. Here are a few things your friends can do: ^{[4]
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- Dress up as ghosts, goblins, or zombies and grab, shout at, or make noise around your guests when they least expect it.
- "Guide" the guests through the different haunted rooms.
- Take charge of different activities or games.

10

Plan spooky activities.

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Make your haunted house interactive. If you want your haunted house to be a bit less terrifying and more fun for your guests, especially younger ones, set up a different spooky activity in each room. Here are some activities to try:
- Fill a tub with cold water and place fake snakes in it, along with some coins on the bottom. Tell your guests they can't move on until they reach down and find a coin.
- Carve apples to look like skulls and play "bobbing for skulls"!
- Peel the skin off a bunch of grapes and put them in a bowl. Cover the bowl and tell your guests to put their hands inside and tell you what they feel. Correct answer: eyeballs!
- Set up tables with crafting supplies and make Halloween masks and Halloween decorations for your guests to take home.

11

Play up the jump scares.

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Jump scares are very effective when it comes to getting people to scream during a haunted house visit. Have a room with a closed coffin in the center. Have a few activities or surprises to keep the guests busy in the room. Then, right before they leave the room, have a "skeleton" jump out of the casket.
- You can also have characters jump out during certain sections of the house as the visitors walk through.
- If your guests are teens or adults, have an actor chase them while holding a chainsaw that no longer has a chain.

12

Set up dummies to fake out your guests.

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Your guests will get used to the dummies as they walk through. Have your friends blend in with these lifeless props and jump out at your guests when they least expect it. This will work especially well at the entrance or exit of the house.^{[5]
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- Buy a dummy or make one yourself by stuffing clothes with newspaper and putting a face mask over a balloon.

Community Q&A

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Question

How do I find the perfect time to scare my guests?

Community Answer

It is best to scare them when they are distracted, by others or some specific prop/item/action. Example: they walk in a room and in front of them is a person they are expecting to scare them (that person is the draw). Then you come up behind or from the side and scare them while their focus is elsewhere (you are the hit).

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I have a small hallway. What should I do?

Michael Hathman

Community Answer

For best effect, you could decorate it all in black and hang big spiders in cobwebs (if you can get them to move battery-operated, all the better). Seems to really add to the "scare factor" because so many people are terrified of spiders.

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If I make a haunted house should I charge for it?

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This should depend on how much effort was put in and how big or it is. Ask some friends or neighbors to check the haunted house out, and afterward ask them what they think would be a good admission price.

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Make sure your neighborhood or apartment complex is okay with you having a haunted house if it will be noisy.

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Warnings

Avoid lighting real candles in your haunted home. Remember that an essential component of a haunted house is the element of surprise, and if your guests are truly frightened, they might run into or bump into a candle and set your haunted house on fire.

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