Rituals for moving into a new house

Article by Singapore Feng Shui Master Edwaard Liu

Moving into a new house is an important event; and it requires auspicious date selection. When you move into a new premise, the energy of the new premise will connect with you, having an auspicious moving in date will make the connection more harmonious.  The influence of the heaven (auspicious timing) , earth (Feng Shui) and human (harmony) are all important. (天时地利人和)

For moving in dates, we prefer it to be auspicious days, for example

Abundance day 满日 – for activity that bring good returns and prosperity

Success day 成日- for activity that requires a positive start and positive outcome

Other suitable days includes, Establish day 建日 initiate day，定日 Stable day etc

The day that is selected must also be in harmony with the occupants’  Bazi (derived from the birthdate and time ) The date selected must not clashes with the occupants’ Bazi, or it may bring disharmony and negative influences. To the Chinese, the start of anything important, an auspicious date selection is a must.

Large furniture like beds, sofa, fridge or washing machine should be in the house already before the occupants start the moving in ritual. The reason is for the premise’s energy to be stable first before occupants move in; and not to have big furniture move in on the same day and disrupt the energy.  For the same reason, renovation must be completed on the day of moving in.

In the old days, every household would need to have the following items for food and cooking and also to represent abundance柴,米,油,盐,酱,醋,茶, fire wood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, tea leaves. They bring with them these items to a new premise when they move home. However we no longer use firewood and not everyone cooks these days, at least the rice pot needs to be full on the day of moving in to symbolise abundance.

Once the date is selected, the auspicious timings also need to be establish,  hours that has auspicious stars are deem to be full of support, while timing that have negative stars need to be avoided.

If auspicious time is between 9am to 10.59am, do not enter at 9am sharp, sometimes your watch may be faster. Enter at least 15 minutes later at 9.15am.

Sequence of who enter first

1. Head of the family
2. Children and other family members
3. Domestic helper

People not staying in the house should not come on that day. Visitors should come another day; because the moving in date is for occupants to connect with the energy of the house.

The Chinese has other rituals like saying auspicious things when you enter the premise,  wishing wealth, health and harmony for the people in the house. You can also throw coins into your house to symbolize money coming in, then pick them up, do not give the money away; you can keep or use it yourself later.  

In Singapore and Malaysia, people like to roll  pineapples into the new house because in the hokkien dialect it sounds like 旺来(wang lai)，or literally translated as ”prosperous come “, to welcome prosperity into the home.

Open all doors and window to allow energy to circulate in your house, switch on all lights, for at least 2 hrs. Boil a kettle or pot of water with your stove, when it boiled you can off it. Fire from the stove symbolise warm relationship within the family. You can also cook sweet desserts for the family members. Cook a pot of rice to be consumed by family members.

Some people like to sprinkle salt and 5 colour beans around the house. Some people say that the beans need to be sprouted for good luck, so they put them on wet cotton wool and after that they throw it away. Some people scatter the beans with salt and tea leaves. Everyone say it is tradition, and it is good to do so; but when questioned, no one knows why you do it.

What exactly is it for? Getting rid of evil spirits? Blessing the place? Or does it represent having an abundance of food? From my experience, getting rid of evil spirits is not as easy as scattering beans and salt, so we can rule that out. Some people believe the 5 colours in the beans represent the 5 elements, white for metal, black for water, green for wood, red for fire, brown for earth. Some people believed that sprinkling the beans everywhere in the house represent having all elements harmonized in the house.

In the olden days people bring with them beans, seed and rice to plant at the field near their new home, so that they can have food and represent abundance of food. They actually grow the food and eat them, these days bringing the bean into the house is purely symbolic.

For family with spiritual believes, it is also a good day to pray to the Heaven, Earth Deity and Ancestors. (天，地，人). Many traditional Chinese believe the Earth Deity土地公is the guardian for the home and every home has a guardian, on the day of moving in, they pray to the Earth Deity  for blessings.

Everything else that is above the ground is governed by the lord of heaven 天公 also known as the jade emperor 玉帝, since we are living in three dimensional space, we also wish to invoke the blessing of the jade emperor when moving into the new house. Prayer to the ancestors are a form of respect to inform your ancestors that you have moved, regardless of whether you have a shrine dedicated for them at home. Many people do not know that ancestors have the ability to bless their descendants, if they pay respect their ancestors. One of the easiest way is to buy pre-packed joss paper offering for the lord of Heaven, Earth Deity and ancestors. 天公，土地公，祖先, which is usually available at incense and joss paper shops. If you do not have an altar at home, you can bring the offerings to your new house, pray and ask for blessings in the house, then light the incense and offering outside the house.

In this article, I shared some simple rituals that people can do, when you are moving office or into new homes, I wish you good luck and prosperity in your new premises.

Find out more about what we can do for your premise’s Feng Shui.