First Impressions

Your property’s photos must be top-notch for it to achieve its optimal selling price

One of the major obstacles to getting great photos to show-off your properties is, believe it or not, your client. Many just don’t think about preparing their homes in the way that they’d think about washing their car and emptying-out the fish and chip papers before taking that to the dealer. It’s not unusual to arrive at homes to find dirty dishes in the sink and unmade beds. I once found dirty dishes in the bed!

In an earlier blog, I chatted about motivating your vendors to get their homes prepared and one of the ways to do this is to point out that they’ll help optimise their selling price if they ‘get creative’ and dress the home as they’d like to find it if they were seeing it for the first time, before you arrive.

As a photographer several years ago, I prepared a pamphlet that I’d ask my estate agents to give to their clients before my visit. I would call the vendor in advance of my visit and most times the agent had forgotten to pass it on, so I always emailed it to them. Every time I photographed a property I’d ask if the owner had found my tips useful. I can promise you that without exception, they were full of praise for the idea as I had made suggestions that hadn’t crossed their minds. Photographing interiors when they’re neat and tidy and creatively dressed is much more beneficial to the marketing and you won’t have to turn up with your pinny and feather duster and spend ages sorting it out if you do the same.

That was then. Now we have updated the pamphlet to give it a much more professional and contemporary look. The front page makes the motivation for cooperating very clear and the text explains in fairly informal terms what owners can do to help themselves.

Download our First Impressions pamphlet

You are welcome to use this for FREE in its current format branded to Doctor Photo. Alternatively, if you would like us to brand it to you, we could do that and add your own photos for £70 +VAT. Just email us at studio@doctor-photo.co.uk.