The worldwide $4+ trillion real estate market will reach $4.6 trillion by 2028.
Besides, you’re expected to make a lot of blunders when you’re first beginning a new photography niche! Those photography errors can teach you a lot about the ins and outs of any sector you work in.
Even so, paying attention to others who are ahead of you is usually a smart idea. You may learn from their mistakes and avoid making them yourself.
Real estate photography has no difference because market demands may differ dramatically from one city to the next. But, there are some common Austin real estate photography mistakes you may avoid right away. Doing so can help you stand out from the rest.
Continue reading to learn about Houston real estate photography mistakes and how to avoid them.
The Importance of Staging Your Property Before Listing
Staging your property will make it appealing to the largest pool of potential buyers. The best staging will let buyers imagine themselves living in your home.
The process will show the property’s good features while hiding its flaws and making it look better in photos. When choosing to sell your home, you can’t afford to settle for a lower selling price or a long marketing period.
Staging might be the most lucrative project you will ever undertake. Potential buyers are often looking to fulfill their dreams and improve their lifestyles.
Home staging is beneficial since buyers do not want to see the work they need to do when they move into your home. For every problem they spot, they may deduct the cost from their offering price.
If they spot too many problems with your property, they won’t buy the home. Consider engaging the best Austin real estate photography services to assist with your home staging.
The most common areas a real estate photo service provider will stage include the living room, kitchen, bedroom, and dining room. The service provider will know the staging mistakes to avoid.
Here are the 10 common real estate photography mistakes and how to avoid them.
1. Featuring Blurry or Poor-Quality Photos
Top companies can’t use blurry images to sell their products, so avoid using blurry photos to sell your Texas home. An out-of-focus photo can show that you don’t take pride in your property.
In a worst-case scenario, blurry images can mean your house has features worth hiding. Nowadays, digital cameras come with an autofocus feature, so blurry photos are due to unsteady hands.
You can opt to use a tripod to help in getting steady shots. The tripod will allow you to take slower shutter speeds by utilizing natural light, keeping your images sharp.
Also, hire professional real estate photography services to assist. They know the best photo editing techniques and can avoid common real estate photography mistakes.
But, ensure you’re choosing the one with the right expertise and experience. Also, check the photographers’ online reviews and go through the contract and payments beforehand.
The number of your photos may also pique a potential homebuyer’s interest. A few property photos in your listing are not enough in today’s market.
Ensure you have at least 20 photos in your listing. If, by chance, your property is a small townhouse or condo, show off the lifestyle bit with basketball courts or shared spaces.
Consider uploading the maximum amount if you’re using listing services with a maximum photo limit.
2. Marketing the House Rather Than the Lifestyle
There is a huge difference between marketing a home and marketing the lifestyle of its residents. If you want to stand out, your photos must feature what promotes a way of living.
Avoid having sterile photos or showing empty rooms that look useless and unoccupied. If you’re going the lifestyle route, show the home as an invitation allowing buyers to see themselves in the picture.
For instance, if you’re showing a dining room table, you can set it for a dinner party. That will show the house is great for entertainment. But, avoid featuring too many personal items since they can make the image feel cluttered and uninviting.
Note that consumers looking through photos can add things mentally but can’t easily subtract things. So, it’s a true case where less is more.
Also, your property sale transaction involves selling space, not stuff. Marketing a lifestyle will be good until excessive personal trinkets or clutter deters a potential buyer.
Before taking your Houston real estate photo, ensure your home is clean and organized, and all supplies are not visible. To help know the items that should and shouldn’t be visible in your home, hire a professional home stager.
3. Varying Light Temperatures
Though some professionals recommend shooting with all lights off, there are varying opinions. Be aware of the different light temperatures and ensure you balance them out when editing.
Incandescent lights are warmer than sunlight making interior lights very yellow and sunshine a bit blue. You can use brushes in Lightroom to correct the imbalance.
Adjust the temperature slide to cancel the color you’re correcting. Blue cancels out the warm lights, while yellow cancels out the cool blue light.
The fluorescent lights can have a green tint to them. You can adjust the brush for a red tint to even out the issue.
Is there a glow of light from a nearby light fixture or window? Use the graduated filter to balance out the temperature seamlessly.
Good lighting is critical for your Houston area real estate photography. The right lighting can even make your property look bigger, and basing it on what buyers want; space is second to location.
4. Featuring Items That Might Make You Vulnerable to Theft
Do you have priceless works of art in your home? What about a desk covered in financial paperwork or a car showing its license plate?
Showing such items can attract the attention of fraudsters and thieves. They will hope to take advantage of your home’s accessibility.
Showings and open houses might provide a good opportunity for people to steal your identity or prized possessions.
Ensure you lock away your paperwork and store collectibles in a secure off-site location. Keep your credit cards, license plates, and SSN out of view when undertaking your Dallas real estate photography.
5. Failing to Have a Shot List
Often, real estate photography is fast-paced. The budgets are also low, and clients are in a hurry to get their listing into the market – time is of the essence.
A great way to take the least time possible is to plan a general shot list for your San Antonio real estate photography assignment. Though most homes have unique details or qualities, some standard shots apply to all properties.
For instance, you’ll need a wide shot for each bathroom and bedroom. But, you can choose to add an extra wide shot in an area with more interest in the design.
If your time allows, you can decide to add some details or vignettes. You should start with a basic shot list and keep adding or modifying where needed.
6. Editing Each Photo Individually
While still on the topic of keeping the process quick, consider editing. Clients might derail each photo, but customers aren’t often looking for artistic work.
Instead, you need clean and professional photos showing all spaces and enticing buyers to your property. Your real estate photographer Houston should edit in batches.
There are a few ways to incorporate this into the workflow. Once you save previous edits as presets, apply presets to sets of photos while importing.
Or, you can edit a particular photo, then select a set of photos after it, and click on ‘Sync’ to apply the settings to the selected images. You may still have to go through the images to ensure the lines, lens correction, and edits are okay.
Batch editing will save you a lot of time. Note that extreme editing might make potential buyers think you’re hiding something.
Also, avoid making numerous adjustments, such as blurring out an unattractive view or dramatically altering a room’s shape. That’s because it can constitute fraud.
7. Shooting With Fisheye
When thinking about lenses, some photographers think wider is better. Though a wide-angle lens is appropriate for most listings, don’t go too wide.
Anything wider than 16mm on a full sensor camera or 10mm on a cropped camera sensor enters the fisheye lenses classification. The ultra-wide lenses will have more distortion, making the space hard to see clearly.
The degree of distortion will also make it very hard to straighten out lines and correct lens distortion during editing. Instead of having professional photos, the pictures can look like amateur snapshots.
As with all recommendations, experiment more on your own to find the ideal process that works for you. Look at the top professional real estate photos in your area to know what not to do and what to emulate.
8. Featuring Out-Dated Photos
Featuring images taken long ago is a form of listing photo fraud. Real estate photo service providers should be up-to-date and show how the house looks now to potential buyers.
At times, homeowners might have old photos, but they don’t reflect the house. The same applies to seasonal photos.
You don’t want to show Christmas decorations or snow on the roof during March. Always update your listing photos to ensure you’re keeping up with the current seasons.
Ensure you’re switching out seasonal photos, especially when your home takes longer to sell. If your winter photos don’t sell your home, greener might work better.
9. Close-Up Shots
We hear a common misconception that showing your property’s best features requires you to take many close-up shots. But, the reality is that close-up shots will make the rooms look smaller and are often repetitive.
Have you ever seen a listing with many close-up shots of the closet, kitchen cabinets, baseboard heater, or other oddities? Though the intention was to show the essential information of the house, what viewers feel is boredom.
Customers want to see photos showing the layout and feel the home – not the dull details. Irrelevant items are turn-offs and time wasters for potential buyers.
Be selective on the pictures you choose, and only add in your listing photos showcasing excellent property features. The images have to tell a story and add value to your property.
10. Including Timestamps
Timestamps on your Houston real estate photos will date them very fast. Like featuring seasons, showing the exact date and time you took the photo can sabotage your marketing plan.
That’s so because timestamps reveal the length of your home in the market. They can think that your home is taking too long because of a problem.
Also, timestamps will convey a lack of attention to detail on your part. They will mean you didn’t take enough care to change your camera setting or hire professional real estate photography services.
Here, Photoshop will come in handy. You can remove timestamps by using the “healing brush” program. If you’re not familiar with Photoshop or other editing software, invest in a professional real estate photographer.
Avoid Common Real Estate Photography Mistakes
When selling your Texas property, you need to highlight your home’s best features in your listing. You can only achieve that by avoiding the above real estate photography mistakes.
If the photography task seems too daunting, consider hiring real estate photographers. They will know the best Houston real estate photography practices.
At 154 Photography, we will focus on bringing out your property details so you can focus on the sale process. Our photographers, backed with the latest technology, provide the highest-quality real estate photos.
Contact us now for your real estate property photography needs.