It can be hard to be an estate or letting agent these days, with the state of the current economy and tough competition but there are ways to get head and sell and let properties faster.
Professional photographs of the properties are of real benefit. Great photographs sell houses to the buyers and get them rented to tenants. A great set of photographs can also sway purchasers of commercial properties or make them easier to let. Buyers and tenants have for some time, when looking for the ideal property, made the search online and decide about which properties interest them in seconds. Great photographs will get your potential buyer or tenant excited and wanting to see the property, giving you the best chance to sell or let the property.
So what makes the difference? Here are some of my tips and tricks on how to photograph a house or a commercial property:
- Before the photo shoot: 'dress the house', re-arrange furniture in an eye pleasing way, tidy up and remove all distractive items, especially any clutter, use nice accessories to complement the look of the property, switch on all the lights for a warm glow.
- Use a wide angle lens (24mm is perfect, too wide of a lens would distort the picture). This will enable you to get as much of a room in the shot as possible and will make the property appear more spacious. Try to use a prime lens rather than a zoom lens as a prime lenses allows more light in the camera and that way shoot better in darker conditions.
- Shoot from the corner so you get in as much room as you can.
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- The most important picture is the front of the property, as it will appear in all advertising channels. Concentrate to get that shot right. The best position for this shot is when the sun is behind you and that way the front of the house is nicely lit up. Houses that face south are fine to shoot all day, in case of north and east facing houses you get the best results in the morning, houses that face the west look the best in the afternoon.
- Understand manual camera settings, especially aperture priority mode and white balance settings. If you use the automatic button, you will never achieve photographs with great impact. Correct aperture priority mode will ensure that all parts of the photograph are sharp and if you correct the white balance setting, this will ensure that the photograph does not have an unnatural blue or a yellow hue.
- Try to avoid flash unless you really need to, as flash creates harsh light and ugly shadows. If necessary, use off camera flash or become familiar with the various techniques to soften the flash.
- Edit the photographs in software that will allow you to enhance the photograph by adding vibrancy, changing white balance and exposure. For real impact use HDR software.
You may want to consider using a professional photographer as this could be paid for by the client and help sell or let the property faster and that way enabling the selling or letting agent to obtain their commission more quickly.
