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Does Your Listing Look Out of Season? Or Worse, Is It Invisible?
Earlier today I was visiting with my parents and they mentioned going to a party over the weekend at a very nice home. They said the home owners are frustrated because this home, and their lake home, have been on the market for a very long time (150 and 459 days, respectively). I had been in this home earlier this fall and recalled it as being a great home. So, I went to my parents’ computer and pulled up the listings in MLS. What I found was, unfortunately, not surprising.
The first home has been on the market for 150 days (well, really also about 460 days, but they have switched agents on this one), roughtly three seasons, yet, with a foot of snow on the ground, the photo was a lush summer photo. Don’t get me wrong, it was a beautiful photo that really flattered the home, but since it was taken we have had the leaves change, the leaves drop and snow fall. Any potential buyer looking through listings will immediately recognize that this home has been on the market for a while – and, apparently passed over by other buyers for some reason or another. In fact, both homes still showed early summer photos. Worse, the lake home’s main shot was one looking from the road, which is always a blah angle for a lake home. The real “money” shot is almost always from the lake side.
Admittedly, I am a bit of an over-achiever and also enjoy taking photos, so I was out the day after our last storm updating listings, but a quick look at MLS shows that I am in a very small minority of agents with snow pictures right now. Of the 215 active single family listings in Brookfield only about 15 listings show snow and of those, I have 5.
The main photo of your listing – usually one of the front of your home – is the first thing a buyer looks at. I know what you’re thinking – the price is always the first thing they see. Not so; with the search capabilities of the various real estate sites out their, they input their price range and all but forget about it while they browse the listings. When they are skimming through a broker’s site, such as FirstWeber.com, a real estate site such as Zillow or Trulia, or a listing portal/auto-email system set up by their agent, the first impression they have of your home is that photo. If it is clearly out of season the listing looks old and even unmaintained. If it is the same photo for months, then it becomes invisible. As the buyers scan the listings their eye catches the old photo and their brain says “that one again” and they move on to something they haven’t seen.
Another important thing your agent should be doing with this main photo is varying the angles just enough to make each one different than the last. Even if the trees have changed, or if snow is now on the ground, the exact same angle every time will tend to cause your home to disappear. This isn’t always easy to do as some houses have only one good angle. Do what you can with what you’ve got.
The house on the right was listed April through December. Photos were taken at each change of the season. In the transitional seasons (Spring and Autumn), I like to take photos twice. In the Spring when the snow is gone and then again when the yard begins to bloom. In the Autumn I take them when the leaves are in good color then again when they fall. If the seller is big on Christmas decorations I will be sure to take photos again in the Winter once the decorations come down.
Furthermore, a thorough agent will take note of what is seen when you look out of your window. At the most basic, interiors should be redone depending on what the ground looks like – brown grass, green grass, white snow. If you have foliage outside the windows that goes through major changes (burning bush or sugar maple in the Autumn or flowering trees in the Spring) then your agent should be timing some photos around those features as well. Again, during the Christmas season it is nice to have photos of your halls thoroughly (and tastefully!) decked, but your agent needs to be sure to retake interiors once the decorations come down.
Photos, both interior and exterior, need to be shot in such a way as to allow the buyers to not only see all the important angles and features of the home, but to also be able to let them put themselves in the picture. Once they can do that, you are a long way towards encouraging them to write an offer.
It may seem like such a silly thing to focus on, but with over 90% of all home buyers going first to the Internet, the first time a buyer walks through your door is really a second showing. Your listing needs to be represented online as best as it can be to be kept looking like it was just listed yesterday so as not to give the potential buyers any reason to make a low offer or to completely pass you over.
