The housewarming can wait until welcoming people feels easier than proving you have arrived.

There are two reasons to fill a new house with people, and they feel very different from the inside. One is wanting company; the other is wanting the place to be witnessed, which means every unfinished corner becomes a problem and the evening is quietly a performance with a guest list. The second version is exhausting and usually delays the first by months.

Have two people round before the house is ready, on a weeknight, with something ordinary to eat. Notice whether you are thinking about them or about the room. The party can happen whenever, and it goes better once the house is a place where people have sat.