A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words or $200K!

What is the most important step that you can take in selling your home, besides hiring a fantastic professional Realtor?  The answer:  Make sure that the Realtor that you have hired uses professional photography.  

Why is professional photography so important?  

The simple fact is, most buyers begin their home search online.  If there is no picture of a listing or a poor photo of the listing, buyers move on to the next listing.  This means that no matter how perfect your home is, the buyer may never step foot in your door.  

How can I make sure that my Realtor uses a professional photographer who takes fantastic pictures?  Quite frankly the Realtor should be glowing over the fact that they use a fantastic photographer.  A great Realtor knows the importance of amazing pictures and will show you examples.  If they don't, then ask for examples of their listings.  You can also do a little research prior to your listing interview.  Check out the agent online prior to the listing interview.  If the agent doesn't have a website check Realtor.com for listings that they have active.  If their listings are all sold, just ask them to send you mls links to the listings that they have sold recently.  

Don't the pictures just show up in MLS?  The answer is NO!  These pictures are pulled from the MLS system and syndicated all over the web.  The pictures that you see in Zillow, Realtor.com, Truila, Yahoo, Homes.com, you name it, are pulled from the MLS system.  So those pictures in MLS are extremely important.  They are the first and possibly only look at your home that buyers around the world have.  These pictures may be your one and only shot to get prospective buyers into your home.  

Do I use a professional photographer?  Absolutely!  For all of the reasons above I use an amazing photographer.  My goal is to grab those buyers who are sitting on the couches eating pretzels, house hunting online and pull them into the door of your home.  Hopefully with all of the prep work that we have done in getting the home ready for the market, buyers will be blown away and an offer will be forth coming.