In late 2006, Centex Homes was looking for a way to bring “life” to their largest model home in the “Milestone” community of Santa Clarita Valley as prospective buyers walked though. So they hired actors. They called the show “HomeLife.” From Builder Magazine:

To integrate entertainment with real estate, the agency first came up with a scene: Mom’s surprise birthday. The “family” spends time baking a cake, listening to music, making dinner, and watching television. In other words, all the things real people are probably doing when they are sitting around the house on a Saturday afternoon… Jason Simmons, a 35-year-old professional actor who had a three-year run as a lifeguard on “Baywatch,” was cast as the father. Camille Chen, who has a bunch of credits in TV commercials, was picked as the mom, and a brother and sister team from the local theater company played the fictitious couple’s kids… One visitor told Garfield she never would have known the big Milestone model could hold the 30 to 35 people who went through the house every hour had she not seen it for herself. “Otherwise, she would have had no feel for how spacious this house really is,” the publicist says.

Speaking of actors in the suburbs, in 1957 “I Love Lucy” relocated from the city to the suburbs: Fed up with city life, Lucy schemes a move to the suburbs, not knowing Ricky’s already put a deposit down on a house as an anniversary surprise. But Lucy gets cold feet, and her wacky plan to get their deposit back brings down the house. First air date: January 28, 1957.

…Image and reality collide.