Real Estate Agents Should Take More Photos of Real Estate Properties

Have you every shopped for a new home online? If so, did pictures of homes influence your home shopping? If you're like everyone I've ever met, you probably poured over photos of homes you were interested in buying. Photos help tell the story of a property, so the more photos you can see, the better, right?

Earlier today, I helped give two presentations to groups of real estate agents about their web sites where we covered topics such as how to market their web sites online and what they can do to generate more online leads. One topic covered in both presentations that was met with strange resistance by some in the audience regarded how many photos are acceptable for home listings.

Photos Tell a Story

Agents consistently agree that photos are one of the most important pieces of information found on real estate websites. Clearly, it's easier to sell a home people can see than one they can't, right? And more photos of a property should help even more than just one or two, right? Well, that's where the argument starts to break down for some agents regarding low-end properties. The common comment: "I CAN'T take more than one or two photos of some properties."

This is an interesting predicament. Can you make a marginal properties look great online? Do more photos of marginal properties actually make it harder to sell them?

Photos Save Time

As I think about this, I think the most important factor in this equation is time. Why would an agent who is paid on commission want to spend time driving clients out to look at marginal homes they should have been able to see online? In fact, why would an agent want to drive clients to ANY home to show them things they should have been able to see online?

For example, who do you think is a more qualified prospective home buyer?

Prospect A
Visits agent web site
Searches and finds an affordable home matching their interests at 1100 Oak St
No Pictures of Property

Prospect B
Visits agent web site
Searches and finds an affordable home matching their interests at 1100 Oak St
12 Pictures of Property

Prospect C
Visits agent web site
Searches and finds an affordable home matching their interests at 1100 Oak St
1 Pictures of Front of Property

As an agent, which prospective home buyer would you be most interested in showing this home to? A prospect who hasn't seen even one photo of the home (A), only one photo (C), or twelve photos (B) covering the exterior and interior of the home and property? Clearly the answer is B. Does the price of the home make any difference in this equation? Why, as an agent, wouldn't you take the time to take photos of the property you listed rather than driving prospects out to show them what they should be able to see online?

As a prospective home buyer, which homes do you spend the most time looking at online? Listings with no photos, one photo, or many? Why would you invest your valuable time visiting homes you haven't seen? What would it take to get you to visit a property with no online photos? My guess is an exceptional price may help get you into the car, so the seller's closing price (and agent's commission) end up suffering due to the lack of listing photos. Or, does this mean screening for homes with no photos helps you discover underpriced homes?

I hope this helps explains how everyone benefits from additional photos: the seller, prospective buyers, and the agent. Let's make the world of online real estate a better place by snapping more photos of every home listing.

Ed,
Great point about taking pictures of real estate to assist in the sales process. That is the MINIMUM that every real estate agent should do. I will go one step further and say that the agents that resist change will be left solidly behind.

The newest trend that gaining acceptance (and consumers are searching for and finding online... can you say leads?!) is Audio & Video Podcast Tours of properties. Consumers are adopting podcasts at an alarming rate and the top performing real estate agents "Get It" and are embracing this new real estate 2.0 marketing technology.

if you think showing photos saves time in driving prospects around... imagine the power of video podcasts that you can show them on your Treo Phone, laptop or iPod. Now that is a time saver for sure. How cool would it be to show propects podcasts of your properties when you first meet them at an open house? Pretty impressive if you ask me.

Most Realtors put their own business photos on business cards, web sites, marketing materials, signage, etc.

Photos are very important, but not only the number of photos. As a real estate agent working in Bangkok, the majority of my business comes from the website. There is of course a conflict of trying to weigh up the benefits of having a lot of photos against the fact that the photos take up a lot of space on the hosting and cost more. No only the number of photos but also the size of the photos on your website. Many other estate agents post very small photos (some of which can be enlarged but this is yet another click for the prospective buyer). Some photos are 1" x 1" on the screen and can only really be appreciated with a magnifying glass!!

Neil, thanks for sharing your perspective. I think your issue with hosting space and costs is becoming somewhat unique as hosting space is becoming cheaper and cheaper.

photos are the all and be all for many people as if they don't see a property they like they just visit another site without contacting the agent with the poor quality pictures. Therefore godd pictures are essential for all real estate agents.

I agree with all of you. Why? Because taking good real estate pictures is what I do here in Honolulu.

In regards to the size of the files I have no trouble showing all my client's listing's photos via my server that only costs $95.00 per year. Each Slide Show I produce is Flash, with music and special effects that loads quickly. My clients say there much better than the small, distorted virtual tours.

If your curious to see my work visit ... Ps808.com. If anyone needs a slide show put together all I need are GOOD pictures or at least amost good. I can do almost wonders with photoshop. Cost $85.00

I've also written a 25 page "Take Better Real Estate Pictures" manual specifically for home owners and real estate agents who have DSLR camera or those who are wiling to upgrade to one. I't a must have!

I normally put between 6 and 8 photos of my website of a property, and I have made the photos quite big (500 pixels width). If the photos are too small, then forget it. A lot of people don't see very well and don't want to stare and squint at the screen trying to see minute details.

I agree with your theory, but not your number. It amazes me how few pictures Realtors provide for even multi-million dollar listings. I am looking at a service that provides 50-75 high quality photos, but get this...they draw a floorplan of the house and upload it with a stream of photos that really fills in the blanks for a shopper to where they can see how the rooms flow into one another, closet sizes, etc. Its the bees knees and reasonably priced.

I have used Javascipt for the photos on my website (Bangkok Apartment) but I don't think that this information gets indexed by Google. Does anyone know about this?

You're absolutely right!
The more photos the better. Buildatour.com allows up to seventy-five 800 X 600 images per tour. Other features include music backgrounds, text details, map link, fully-branded and MLS compliant links. etc. Tour links can be posted to personal websites, agency websites, Realtor.com, etc.

Comments

1. Posted by: Peter Davies on July 12, 2006 5:48 AM:

I think real estate agents believe that if they have one or two teaser photos that they will somehow encourage people to pick up the phone.

If I am going to invest my time in looking at a property and going through the qualification process with an agent, I want as much info as possible ahead of time.

Right now I live in the UK but I am interested in properties in France. So a trip to see a property is a BIG investment in time. But I am a serious buyer with cash to fund a property purchase.

Show me all the pictures of all the key rooms so I can see how close their dream home is to my desires. Then we can have a conversation.

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