Complete Havenly Review: Pros, Cons, and Alternatives

Updated January 17, 2023 10:48 AM By Matt Langan

Havenly is an online interior design company, intended to make it easy for homeowners and renters to connect with interior designers and decorate their home beautifully. It utilizes 3D image technology to visualize each room, along with partnerships with some of the largest furniture and decor companies. Plus, Havenly is one of the most affordable design options available--so is it the right choice for you? Read all the pros, cons, and alternatives in this Havenly review before making a purchase. 

• How Havenly Works
• Havenly Pricing and Services
• Pros and Cons of Havenly
• Havenly Alternative
• Where to Start

How Havenly Works

It’s relatively simple to get your rooms designed online. Havenly essentially outlines three steps to the process: 

• “Tell us what you need” - Includes signing up and defining your design style
• “Collaborate online” - Includes choosing your designer, submitting images, communicating with your designer, and receiving their ideas for your design
• “Get the VIP treatment” - After you’ve received the final design concept, you’ll purchase the products in your design through Havenly’s concierge program

Unlike other online interior design services, there is no DIY element to the design process. You simply communicate with your chosen designer about the concepts they send you. You can make revisions until the design meets your expectations.

Related: Learn more about your personal style in The Complete Guide to Interior Design Styles

Havenly Pricing and Services

Havenly keeps their services extremely simple, with only two options:

• Havenly mini: $79 per room
• Havenly full: $179 per room

The Mini package provides a few different design ideas and one final design concept, while the Full package also includes a layout visualization and floor plan like the one shown below.

Havenly works very similarly to Moday, another online interior design company. Read the full Modsy review for more details on the pros and cons of both companies.

Pros and Cons of Havenly’s Online Interior Design Services

Havenly is one of the most popular online interior design services, but there are a variety of mixed reviews. To prevent any problems while decorating your home, make sure you have a full understanding of all the pros and cons of Havenly.

Pros of Havenly

1. Affordable Prices

Havenly is one of the only online design services to offer a room design for under $200. For renters or homeowners who want help decorating their home on a budget, this is an extremely appealing price point.

One of the reasons why Havenly offers such a low price on their designs is because they make a large portion of their money on commissions from product sales. You can read more about that below.

2. Professional Designers

All the designers who work for Havenly are professional designers with licenses and/or certifications. Plus, they’re located in the USA. These are essential factors because it prevents you from having communication difficulties across massively different time zones and language barriers. When you look at Havenly reviews, you’ll see that most users actually love working with their designers. Read more details on Havenly reviews below.

3. Happiness Guarantee

Havenly offers a “happiness guarantee” to all customers. Within the terms of their guarantee, they provide the opportunity to change designers during the design process or receive a refund during or after your project has been completed. Keep in mind that you must request a refund within 3 days of receiving your concept, or within one month of receiving your final concept.

In addition, if you pay for a design without ordering, your fee will never expire. That money will stay in your Havenly account until you’re ready to use it, but they do not refund unused money.

Havenly’s guarantee terms are generally fair to customers. However, if you want revisions or a refund, keep the slow response times of customer service in mind. It will likely take Havenly a minimum of 48 hours to make progress on your account.

Related: 12 Steps + Tips to Decorate Your Living Room Like a Professional Designer

Cons of Havenly

1. Sales Pressure

Havenly works directly with suppliers to offer furniture and decor to customers. Havenly is essentially a middleman between you and the products, which is designed to make it easier for customers to decorate their rooms in less time.

However, in reality, it does the exact opposite.

Previous Havenly customers have discovered that ordering products through the concierge program is actually significantly more expensive than ordering them directly from the stores. There are also many complaints about delays, premature credit card charges, damaged items, and nightmare-ish return processes.

Here’s what one Havenly review said about the return process: 

“The furniture that was recommended, the Safavieh Burton coffee table, and priced by Havenly at $511 was available at big box stores (Target, Walmart, and even Home Depot) for $265!!! The same designer's side table Havenly sold us, for $184.26, was priced at big box stores for $129. So when the quality was not to our liking, we asked to return it.  Their response, after paying over a $300 MARK UP for the two pieces, was that WE have to bear the cost of the returns (over $300 in shipping costs), items that would have free returns had we purchased them directly from a big box store. UNREAL.” (via Facebook)

2. Slow Response Time

There is a phone number and contact form for Havenly’s customer service team. However, they are only available during business hours and struggle to keep up with the demand. When you read through Havenly reviews, you’ll see an overwhelming number of people complain about Havenly’s response time.

Most customers say that they don’t hear from Havenly for two full days, and it takes the same amount of time for any follow up questions. If you are waiting for information on a product, the wait times are likely to be much longer.

3. Company Concerns

It’s not common to consider employee reviews when you’re evaluating a company’s service. However, in Havenly’s case, we suggest you take note of the hundreds of Havenly designers who have complained about the company on Glassdoor.

In fact, many of Stuccco designer’s come to the platform after working for Havenly. We have first-hand knowledge that Havenly’s designers get paid less than minimum wage.

In addition, both Glassdoor reviews and our designers note that Havenly expects designers to meet an unreasonable demand with very little pay. The company doesn’t manage its happiness guarantee, so customers can actually ask for revisions after the design process is over. This adds to the designers’ workloads and does not give them any additional compensation.

The company’s treatment of employees does impact their customers--would you want to hire a designer who’s miserable and doesn’t have enough time for you?

As one former employee said, “There is more priority on sales and meeting numeric goals than there is on design artistry and quality.”

4. Negative Reviews

Havenly has a review page as well as a few sponsored posts from bloggers and designers, but you should always read third-party sources for unbiased reviews. We found the following unbiased reviews on Facebook and Trustpilot.

Here are some positive Havenly reviews:

• “I had a fantastic experience with Jemma, so much so that I worked with her on a second room. She was able to create a design unique to our style, and we love both spaces! She was super responsive and helpful. And I had a lot of fun along the way!”
• “My designer, Haley, has totally knocked it out of the park and exceeded my expectations for our living room space!  I fully intend to continue working together as we tackle the home projects room by room.”
• “I loved my experience with Havenly. Very professional and the whole process was fun. My final design was just what I was looking for and I can’t wait to get started.”

Here are some negative Havenly reviews:

• “Their ordering process is cumbersome and inaccurate. They can mix up the item you chose when transcribing your orders. This means you will be sent the wrong item which you then have to return on your own dime. Havenly does not try to compensate you for their mistake. Due to their inability to rectify this, I cannot recommend Havenly for their shopping service.”
• “Consistent with many other users, this has been an extremely frustrating experience.  Customer service is nearly non-existent as it takes DAYS just to get a response to simple questions. And if you ask another question as a follow up, guess what? "I'll have to get back to you in 1-2 business days."
• “It is more of a customer service rep/bot than an actual designer. Lots of copy and paste by the designer on the other line and automatic responses. I really looked forward to this experience and was let down.”
• “Okay Havenly-- I started this bedroom project on March 9. It is May 19 and I am still waiting for my 3d rendering. I have sent numerous emails and you have promised in every single one of them-- "early next week." This is really unacceptable. I love my designer and I want to work on other projects with her but I have to let people know that Havenly is in the business of jerking your chain.”
• “DO NOT order from Havenly! I cannot stress this enough. I ordered a West Elm chair in December and was sent a wicker basket from Pottery Barn in February. I still have no idea when I will see the chair, but they did send me a notice that I needed to return the basket to them in 7 days or they will charge me. I am responsible for repackaging and taking it to UPS. They also didn't send me a label to return it, so I'm not sure when I will see that. The customer service hours are extremely limited, no weekends, and all they do is tell me "I understand...we're working on it." I am beyond frustrated.” 

Related: 13 Tips to Decorate Your Bedroom Like a Professional

Havenly Alternative

If you’re looking for the best online interior design services (and you should be!), look no further. Welcome to Stuccco. 

Here’s how Stuccco’s online interior design service works: 

• Schedule your free design consult
• Research designers OR choose one of three we suggest after the call
• Submit photos and questionnaire
• One-on-one consultation with a professional interior designer
• Receive your 3D renderings within 14 days
• Continue to collaborate and revise your design
• Purchase items on your own time, from your own platform

Whether you have an empty room, a cluttered room, or just a few existing pieces you want to include, we work with you personally to create the best possible design.

There’s no rushing through the process or motivation of commissions. Stuccco’s only motive is to create the absolute best design for you and your family.

That’s why we don’t offer a service to purchase your furniture--instead, we’ll provide you with links to get it directly from the source.

Our designers aren’t expected to complete an unreasonable number of designs, and they’re not paid a commission because they’re paid fairly to begin with. 

In fact, many of our designers have come directly from other online interior design platforms that didn’t treat them fairly.

Want to compare our reviews with Havenly’s? You can see our interior design reviews from our website, as well as our public Google reviews.

Comparison of Havenly and Stuccco Features

Feature	Havenly	Stuccco
Price	$79 per room for Mini $179 per room for Full	$999 per room $1,499 for open concept
Time per room	2 days - 3 weeks	14 days
Choose your designer	Y	Y
Free design call	N	Y
Professional interior designers	Y	Y
Design quality	Limited	Y
Shopping list	N	Y
Design instructions	N	Y
No sales pressure	N	Y
Customize to your design budget	N	Y
Unlimited revisions	Y	Y

 

Where to Start

If you’re ready to move forward with an online interior design service, there are two FREE ways to get started. 

Room designed by a Stuccco interior designer

First, take the interior design style quiz to determine your unique style. Then, schedule your interior design consultation to get all the answers to your questions.

Schedule Your Design Consultation