What is wrong with this picture?
Ballwin home listed at $240,000
I never thought to use car headlights instead of photography lights…
Two big goofs. Showing up at dusk to take pictures of a home and then parking in the driveway.
Oh, and snow in St. Louis melts with in a day or two. Showing pictures with snow only makes it obvious that you have been on the market for awhile. Sometimes it makes sense to take pictures even with snow rather than delaying getting on the market, but there is no excuse for not going back and retaking the pictures as soon as it melts.
Buyers study pictures to decide if they want to come see your home. If you are selling your home, make sure your pictures don’t disqualify your home before the buyers even walk through the door.
If your home is already on the market, take a critical look at the pictures posted on your listing and ask your agent to redo any of the pictures that send out red flags. If you are preparing to list your home and haven’t yet selected an agent, I would welcome a chance to talk to you. For more information on what I offer my home listing clients, take a look at my FAQ for Sellers or contact me by email.
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{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Interesting. As someone not in real estate, if I saw a pic of a house with snow, I would just assume that the pic was taken by the family at Christmas time. I would not assume that it had been on the market for a long time and the pic was taken by the realtor.
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Stef – Good point. But, if you hired an agent and were paying thousands of dollars to someone to market and sell your home, wouldn’t you expect professional quality pictures? An agent that takes pictures that don’t showcase the house in the best possible light is really doing a disservice to their clients.
Wow – lazy agent, or what? Professional pictures make such a difference, I think.
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As someone scouring the MLS these days in prep for a move to Saint Louis, I’ll concur having seen this house there before finding it on your blog, I skipped it by virtue of the weird photograph. Makes it seem as though the realtor’s only sort of serious about selling the home. Good call. In that light the home looks cold.
Laura – your reaction is exactly why it is important for a listing agent to take quality pictures that can be posted to the internet. A seller can’t afford to miss even one potential buyer, especially in a down market like we what we are dealing with now.
But I would encourage you to not write off homes just because of bad pictures. As an agent that has worked with many relocating buyers, I can preview homes after talking to my clients to see if a home matches my client’s needs. Relo buyers, in particular, often have a limited amount of time and don’t have the time to screen through all the bad homes in person to find a gem. But, the gem could be a house with bad pictures. You should get an agent to help you check out homes so you don’t miss a good one due to bad marketing.