Are Professional Pictures and Videos for Listings Important?

You bet they are! In this strong Seller's Market I see a lot of agents skipping the expense of a professional photographer in lieu of taking pictures with their phones. The rational is, "Why spend the money on a professional when the house will sell the first day anyway?". The problem with that is the house may not sell the first day. It might sit for a while. I can show you plenty of homes that have been on the market 30 plus days. You don't hear about these very often because everyone likes to talk about the quick sales. It is common for a house to have 3 'showings' and it's important for your house to look it's best in each of the 3.

The first one is a virtual showing. That's the one that results from your house hitting the Dayton MLS, Zillow, Realtor.com and so on. You've got to look good online or you can blow your shot at the other two showings. If you've been house hunting online you've seen the poorly done photos with dark rooms, improper orientation where the phone was held vertically instead of horizontally, narrow photos that should have been taken with a wide angle lens, etc. I've even see photos loaded upside down, redundant photos and pictures out of focus! Bad photos that provide a poor representation of the home can and do turn buyers off and cause the home to fail to make the buyer's shortlist.

Tune in to next week's tips when I discuss the other two showings that the best Realtors think are so important to the success of your sale.