How to Get Eye-Catching Photos for Online Listings

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It is more important than ever to curate your home’s first impression when it’s on the market. Now that around 92% of people use the internet during their search for a new home, you have more power to curate its first impressions with photography. Getting the perfect photos for an online home listing may just be an art. Don’t worry, it’s a very accessible art when you know what you’re doing! There are entire curated lists of especially terrible real estate photos, so check some of those out to get a basic idea of extremely bad choices you should avoid.

Have the obvious stuff out of the way? Besides staging, getting the photos themselves right is important. Take these three tips.

Optimize Lighting

Lighting is everything! A home can look gloomy, moody, cozy, or cheerful with just a change in light. A welcoming shot of the exterior of the home lit up at night is a nice unexpected photo, but you also want to focus on bright-lit pics for the interior. If the lighting that already exists in the house is too dim, bring in some white sunny-toned LED lamps. LEDs are much brighter than halogens or even compact fluorescents, putting out 85% more light than halogens despite only consuming 15% of the energy halogens use. LEDs used correctly can even mimic natural sunlight in photos, giving an airy and welcoming light to the space.

Stick with a Wide-Angle Lens — And Use Caution With Filters

Some people think getting creative with different kinds of lenses on whatever camera they’re using can add a fun element to pictures. This often backfires. For example, using a fish-eye lens to make spaces look bigger is common, but it can often make spaces actually look smaller and annoy potential buyers with the distortion. In the same vein, make sure you’re not using a specialized type, like a portrait lens.

Other people tend to shoot their real estate photos on their phone. Modern smartphones generally have nice enough cameras that these photos come out perfectly usable. However, stay away from harsh filters or drastic setting changes like lighting or color. If you’re listing an apartment for rent, you want it to look like a place your tenant could really make a home. Drastic filter changes can look unprofessional, like you’re hiding something, and it can give buyers unrealistic ideas of  property’s true proportions, colors, and lighting. Overall, it’s distracting.

Quantity is Good

Put simply, take pictures of everything. You can cut them down to an appropriate number later before posting, but during the actual shoot, document everything! All important angles, all attractive features, curb-appeal touting outside pictures and shots of land sold with the home.

Many real estate sites and apps have unlimited capability for photos in one post, but most seasoned realtors seem to recommend 25-40 photos for a full-house listing.

Don’t be afraid to hire a professional if you’re really unsure about handling the photos start-to-finish yourself. There’s no shame in supporting local talent to get the best possible representation for your home’s listing.

This article contains general information and does not contain legal advice. Buy It, Rent It, Profit is not a substitute for an attorney or law firm. The law is complex and changes often. For legal advice, please ask a lawyer.