How to Get Rid of Stink Bugs in Your House: The 6-Step Method That Works on Long Island, and the 2 Things That Make It Worse (2026)

You get rid of stink bugs in your house by removing them mechanically, with a vacuum or a jar of soapy water, trapping the rest with an overnight light trap, and sealing the interior gaps they are coming out of, then sealing the exterior before next September so they never get into the walls again. There is no in-home insecticide that fixes this, and the extension offices that study the bug all say the same thing.

That answer disappoints people, so here is why it is the right one. Cornell's Integrated Pest Management program explains that in the fall brown marmorated stink bugs find their way into wall voids around windows, doors, outlets, light fixtures and air conditioners. The bugs you see on the curtain in November are the few that wandered out of that void into a heated room. The hundreds or thousands still in the wall are untouched by anything you spray in the room, and Penn State notes that killing them inside the void creates a food supply for carpet beetles that then go after wool, stored food and natural fibers in the house.

So the strategy is to deal with the ones that come out, as they come out, with the least smell, and to spend your real effort on the outside of the house at the right time of year. That is the 6-step method below, and it is what we tell every Long Island homeowner who calls about stink bugs between now and spring.

There are so many stink bugs in your house right now because late October is the end of the brown marmorated stink bug's move-in season. Penn State Extension states adults begin searching for overwintering sites from September through October, and Cornell notes they are attracted to vertical structures in their search for protected spots, like loose bark or gaps in siding. Your house is the biggest vertical structure with the most gaps for a hundred yards.

The trigger is the weather. Penn State describes the bug being drawn to the outside of houses on warm fall days, and Cornell Cooperative Extension puts Long Island's average first 32 degree freeze between October 20 and just after November 10. The pattern every year on the North Shore and in central Suffolk is a string of cold nights followed by a sunny afternoon in the 60s, and that afternoon the south and west walls of light-colored houses are covered. By evening they have walked into the gap behind the shutter, under the siding lap, or around the window frame.

Why your house and not the neighbor's: exposure, color, and gaps. Cornell notes a large number of them might gather in crawl spaces, wall voids and above false ceilings especially near the building's sunny side. A white or light gray colonial in Huntington with a west-facing rear wall and original double-hung windows gets hit harder than the dark brown ranch next door with new vinyl. It is not a cleanliness problem. It is a building problem, and that is good news because building problems can be fixed.

This bug is an import. Penn State records it being first collected in September 1998 in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and it has spread across most of North America since. It had no natural enemies here to speak of, which is why a single house can collect thousands of them in a season.

It is a brown marmorated stink bug if it is shield shaped, 1/2 to 5/8 inch long, marbled brown, and has light bands on the antennae and along the edge of the abdomen. Cornell puts the adult at 12 to 15 millimeters, and Penn State notes the lighter antenna bands and darker bands on the overlapping wing membrane at the rear are the features that separate it from other stink bugs.

Three other fall invaders get called stink bugs on Long Island and are not. The western conifer seed bug is longer and narrower, reddish brown, with a flattened leaf-shaped section on each hind leg; Cornell lists it as a separate overwintering pest that feeds on pine cones. The boxelder bug is black with red lines on the back, and it clusters on sunny walls near maple and boxelder trees. The multicolored Asian lady beetle is round, orange to red, and shows up a couple of weeks later in November; we cover that one in why there are ladybugs in your house in November. All four come in the same way and leave the same way, so the method below works on all of them, but only the stink bug and the lady beetle leave a smell when crushed.

If you are not sure, the stink bugs and fall invaders pest profile has the side by side photos, or send us a picture and we will tell you.

This is the order that removes the most bugs with the least odor and sets up next year. Steps 1 through 4 are for right now. Steps 5 and 6 are for the house, and they are the ones that matter.

1. Collect what you can see without crushing them. Knock them into a jar or cup with an inch of soapy water, or vacuum them with a shop vac or a vacuum you do not mind smelling for a while. Penn State notes a vacuum may hold the stink bug smell for a period of time, so the stocking trick helps: push a knee-high stocking into the hose, hold it at the opening with a rubber band, and the bugs collect in the stocking instead of the canister. Tie it off and put it in the outside trash. Never crush them on a wall; the fluid stains and Penn State reports it can cause dermatitis on skin.
2. Run the overnight light trap in the rooms where you see them. Fill a foil roasting pan with about half a gallon of water, add a squirt of dish soap and swish it, and set a desk lamp pointed at the water in a dark room overnight. Virginia Tech entomologists tested this in 16 houses over two years and found it caught 14 times more stink bugs than store-bought traps. The bugs orient to the light, land on the water, and the soap breaks the surface tension so they cannot climb out. Run it every night for a week in the rooms with the most activity, then whenever you see a new batch after a warm day.
3. Find where they are coming out and caulk it. Penn State says bugs that reach living areas typically emerge from cracks under or behind baseboards, around window and door trim, and around exhaust fans or lights in ceilings. Watch where they appear in the first hour after the sun hits that side of the house. Seal those interior gaps with caulk so the ones in the void stay in the void until they leave on their own in spring. This is the step most homeowners skip, and it is the one that cuts the daily count in half.
4. Check the attic and the window tracks. On a Long Island cape or colonial with a walk-up attic, the attic and the upstairs window frames on the sunny side are usually where the mass is. Vacuum what is loose, caulk the gaps around the attic windows and the top plates, and leave the rest. Do not dust or spray the attic.
5. Seal the outside of the house before mid September next year. Penn State calls mechanical exclusion the best method and names the spots: cracks around windows, doors, siding, utility pipes, behind chimneys, and underneath the wood fascia, sealed with good quality silicone or silicone-latex caulk, plus repaired screens. On the houses we see hit hardest, the gaps are the shutter mounts, the window trim where it meets the siding, the soffit and fascia line, the dryer and bath vents, and the AC line set penetration. Start on the south and west walls.
6. On a house with a history, schedule a licensed exterior treatment for late September. Penn State says exterior insecticide applications may offer some relief where completely sealing the exterior is difficult, that they should be applied by a licensed pest control operator in the fall just prior to bug congregation, and that sunlight breaks the material down so it may not kill much beyond several days or a week. Timing is everything: the treatment has to go on the sunny walls, eaves, soffits and window lines in the last two weeks of September, before the first big aggregation day. Applied in November it does nothing, and we will tell you that rather than sell it to you.

No, brown marmorated stink bugs do not bite, do not breed indoors, and do not damage the house. Penn State states plainly that the stink bug will not reproduce inside structures or cause damage. They do not eat your food, your clothes, or your houseplants while overwintering; they are dormant, living off fat reserves until spring.

The two real issues are the smell and the skin. Penn State reports the bugs can produce allergic reactions, rhinitis and conjunctivitis, in people sensitive to the odor, which is an aeroallergen, and that people sensitive to cockroach and lady beetle odors may be particularly affected. If the bugs are crushed against exposed skin they can cause dermatitis at the point of contact in a small percentage of people. Cornell adds that handling crushed stink bugs can cause contact dermatitis. So if someone in the house has asthma or allergies and the count is high, that is a reason to run the traps and seal the interior gaps promptly rather than wait them out.

Outdoors is a different story. Penn State documents the bug feeding on apples, peaches, tomatoes, beans, corn, soybeans and many ornamentals, with the characteristic cat-facing damage on fruit. If you grow tomatoes or peaches on the Island, the bugs you let out of the house in April are the same ones that hit your garden in July.

No. Spraying or fogging stink bugs inside the house does not solve the problem and creates a second one. Penn State Extension states it is not advisable to use an insecticide inside after the insects have gained access to the wall voids or attic, and the Virginia Tech researchers who tested home traps noted there are no in-home insecticides labeled for use against brown marmorated stink bugs.

Here is the mechanism, because people push back on this. An aerosol fogger kills the bugs sitting on the ceiling and walls of that room and nothing in the wall. Penn State notes it will not prevent more of the insects from emerging shortly after the room is aerated, so you are back to the same count in a week with a chemical film on everything. A crack and crevice spray aimed into the baseboard gap does not stop them from emerging either; Penn State calls it not viable and not recommended. And an insecticidal dust pumped into a void can kill hundreds of bugs, which sounds like a win until the carpet beetles arrive to feed on the pile and then move on to the wool rug and the pantry.

The other thing that makes it worse is crushing them in numbers. The defensive fluid stains paint and fabric, can irritate skin, and leaves the odor in the room. Vacuum, soapy water, and the overnight trap are the tools. That is the whole indoor toolkit, and it is enough.

Yes, the stink bugs in your house will go away on their own, but not until spring. Cornell notes overwintered adults generally become active in April when they leave structures to mate. Between now and then you will see them whenever the sun warms the wall they are in, and you will see a burst of them in late March and April on their way out.

What happens in between is a slow trickle. Bugs that reach a heated room burn through their reserves and die on windowsills. Bugs that stay in cool wall voids and the attic ride the winter out and leave in April to lay clusters of 20 to 30 eggs on the undersides of leaves from May through August, per Cornell. They are not reproducing in your house and they are not multiplying over the winter. The number inside only goes down from here.

The catch is that a house that got hit this year is a marked house. The same exposure, the same color, the same gaps are there next September, and the bugs will aggregate on it again. Penn State's whole management approach is built on that fact: prepare before the fall. Waiting it out works for this winter. It does not work for the next one.

You keep stink bugs out next fall by sealing the exterior of the house before mid September and, where the house has a history of heavy invasions, having a licensed applicator treat the sunny exterior walls and entry lines in the last two weeks of September, just before the bugs congregate. Once they are in the walls in October, the window for prevention has closed for the year.

The sealing list comes straight from Penn State: caulk cracks around windows, doors, siding, utility pipes, behind chimneys and underneath the wood fascia with silicone or silicone-latex caulk, and repair or replace damaged screens. Cornell adds screens and good seals around doors and windows as the first line. Work the south and west walls first, because that is where they land, and look at the house the way a bug does: anywhere a vertical gap gives shade and shelter. Shutters, trim lines, the gap where the siding meets the foundation, the soffit vents, and the sleeve around the AC line set are the five we find open on most Long Island houses.

On exterior treatment, we will give you the honest version. Cornell describes professional perimeter applications to eaves, soffits, roof vents, flashing, chimneys, doors and windows as an option when very large numbers are gathering in the surrounding landscape, and calls it an extreme measure that needs real attention to safety and air quality. Penn State notes the residual lasts days to a week in sunlight. So it is not a one-and-done spray, and it is not something to put on a house that gets a dozen bugs a year. Where it earns its place is a house that collects hundreds, treated by a licensed applicator on the right walls in the right two weeks, paired with sealing so there is less to treat every year after. That is how we run a general insect treatment on Long Island for fall invaders, and we schedule those jobs in early September, not November.