One of the most important things that I talk with home sellers about when listing their home is the importance of photographs in marketing their home. With most all buyers search for homes on the Internet, most are making their decisions based on the photographs of the house. I have gotten calls from buyers saying "What’s wrong with this house I’m looking at on-line? It doesn’t have any photos. It must be really bad." Well, sometimes it is, and sometimes isn’t.
The Arizona Regional MLS requires at least one photo of the front of the house, and allows for unlimited photos of the rest of the home and the surrounding neighborhood. Besides the MLS system, home listings are syndicated, and photographs are shared with many services around the Internet, including AZCentral, Google, Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com, and many others. I also use the photos for flyers and for a home’s personal web site.
While I take photos for most my foreclosure listings, I hire a professional photograph for most typical and short sale listings. I hire a pro for a couple of reasons:
- His camera is much better than mine.
- He takes photos of lots of homes for sale daily. He sees different angles than I do.
- He may make a few suggestions to improve a shot.
- He gives me input into the salability of the house, compared to other homes he’s been to recently.
- He creates the virtual tours (with music that can be muted) for me to add to the MLS and syndicates them to YouTube.
For a typical home, 15-20 photos will usually be enough to give the flavor of a home. I have seen listings with 60-80 photos, and I’m not convinced that this is the best way to market a house. The purpose of the photographs is to get the house on the "short list", and get a buyer in the door. My goal is to give the potential buyer a taste of all the best features of the house and its setting, so that they are curious to see more.
Sometimes, I will create a second virtual tour that focuses on the surrounding community. This is especially important for buyers who are moving here from other parts of the country or world.
With some homes, like bank foreclosures, I’ve found that having 4-8 photos dramatically increases the number of showings and offers, which increases the sales price, and shortens the amount of time a foreclosure is on the market. Typical sales and shorts sales do not see as dramatic of a result, but photos in all advertising are required in today’s high-tech market. That’s what buyers are looking for. So that’s what I do to give a house maximum exposure and get it sold.
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