As someone who doesn't live with dogs, the smell of a home with dogs (or cats, for that matter) is, in most cases, immediately apparent to me. If you're not habitualized to the smell, it does actually stink. Not terribly, but it's there.
The point is to keep the smells in reasonable control to a point where its not overpowering. Like dogs do smell. After a month or so they get pretty filthy and stinky. However the fist week/2 they are perfectly fine.