Taking Photos for Real Estate

In today’s internet-driven real estate market, the difference between selling a home quickly and having it sit on the market for months is often the online listing you create. Online listings with excellent pictures draw customers to your property, because they create interest in the property and show potential buyers what the highlights of a particular piece of real estate are. But if you do not know how to properly take pictures of your home, pictures on an online listing can actually detract from the overall appeal of your property! These five tips will help you take the best possible pictures of your property.

Set Your Sights Low

The first tip to take winning real estate photos is to set your sights low. Many pictures of property contain huge amounts of ceiling. If you lower your camera’s lens just a little to cut off most of the ceiling, you can include more of the room and draw the viewer’s eye to the fireplace, wood floor, or wall covering that accentuates the room. No one cares about a ceiling, as long as the room has one. If there is something about the ceiling, such as trim work, that makes it particularly lovely, include just enough of this item to give the viewer a taste. You should avoid taking up too much of the picture with the ceiling, however, no matter what features it has.

Use The View

Does a room in your house have a beautiful view? Consider taking an interior picture in such a way that the view shows in the picture. Rather than describing the view or taking a picture of it from outside the home, allow the picture to convey how the view looks from inside. Potential buyers will appreciate the view so much more if they see it from the place they will be enjoying it when they purchase the home.

Attention To Lighting

Often when a room that is normally bright and cheery is photographed, the resulting picture is dark and dingy. There are a few ways to avoid this problem. Most often the problem is a result of relying on the flash on your camera to provide the lighting. Instead, open the blinds and turn on the lights in the room to bring natural lighting into the picture. Also, set your camera on a lower shutter speed if you can. This allows the film or digital media to absorb more light, creating a brighter image.

Tools such as Photo Shop can also be used to brighten up a dark picture. When you are done with your photo shoot, look at your pictures. If they convey a dark, somber feeling, brighten them up by adjusting the brightness and contrast using Photo Shop or another image editing software. On the other hand, sometimes indoor shots can look too warm, due to the orange glow of tungsten lighting. Again, use your photo editing software to take out some of the orange colors.

Lighting can be a problem outdoors as well. Outdoor shots turn out best on a slightly overcast day, because you will not have to worry about shadows from the sun. You can always add a blue sky using your editing software if you want a to achieve the look of a sunny day without the shadows. If you end up with a spot of sunlight blazing through the trees or unwanted shadows, either change your angle of the shot and snap another, or plan on editing it when you are done.

Take Several Shots

If you were to hire professional photographers to come in and photograph your real estate listing, they would take many shots of the same room. They then would choose the best shot of each area to list on the website. Since you will likely be using a digital camera to take your pictures, there is no reason why you cannot take many pictures of your property. Snap picture after picture, and then sort through them at the end of the day. This way, you are better able to capture the perfect angle or view. Remember to move yourself each time you snap a new picture to take advantage of a different view of the room.

The Key To Winning Outdoor Shots

When most people photograph the outside of their home, they stand across the street and shoot a picture directly facing the house. The main problem with this type of shot is that it does not give any perspective to the picture. If you stand just to the side of your home and take a picture at an angle, it gives the home more depth. Potential buyers are better able to see where the property lines are and how deep the property is. Your home seems more realistic and three dimensional, creating a listing that people will be more interested in calling about in order to schedule a showing!