There’s no shortage of online and in-person advice when it comes to learning to sell your home fast. Most boil down to decluttering, staging your home, finding a good real estate agent and work on the looks and maintenance of your home. The most important tip of all, though, is often an afterthought in these lists and it shouldn’t be.
How often have you browsed through real estate listing sites like Realtor.com and noticed that some homes stand out more than others, and not for the right reasons. In the days of smart phones, everyone is a photographer, but most cell phone photography doesn’t quite cut it when it comes to marketing your home.
What is the number one tip to sell your home fast?
Perspective buyers aren’t getting their first impressions from your agent or your listing price. They are looking at pictures. Do your pictures look crisp and well-lit or are they dark and blurry? Do they show clutter or a neatly staged home?
Did you know that 92 percent of homebuyers (according to realtor.org) use the Internet as part of their home search? That means that listing photos are a critical factor — it will determine the selling price of a home, how quickly it sells and whether it sells at all. I’d venture to say that the single most important factor in selling a home is good photography.
This isn’t only about homes ranging above $1 million; this applies to all homes priced at $200,000 or more. That’s right. Studies have found that good photography helps to sell a home faster and for more money. Keep in mind that with so much research performed online, a good photo can help to get a homebuyer through the door.
Source: Inman.com
If you want to have some fun, do a Google search for bad real estate photos. You’ll find photos of messy beds, kitchens overflowing with trash and even toilets that haven’t been flushed. It should be a no-brainer that you should make your home pristine before taking pictures. More commonly, though, is we see pictures that are too dark or they are overexposed. A professional photographer is an expert at light and at creating the first impression you need to sell your home.
There’s really no excuse. A professional real estate photographer only costs a few hundred bucks. In return, you could make thousands more on your sale and sell much more quickly.
Featured image via Chalon Handmade/Flickr.
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