House photos for selling schedule - wwyd?

[hannahsaunt]

Hints and tips please on what you would do or like to see when viewing the particulars of a house online and in the paper brochure/schedule ... How empty should the rooms look?

(Other than get off the PC and get on with clearing and tidying )

I'd want to get an idea of the period of the house and how big windows are, how high ceilings but, tbh, the floorplans tell me a lot more of value.

We're selling up, and have moved extra chairs and all clutter etc out of the rooms for the photos.

Not sure I should be giving tips though as we've only managed to get one viewing!

When looking at houses online, I am put off if the rooms look really full of stuff, makes the house seem small. Also, dirty houses - eek!

If the room dimensions are on the floorplan that's always good.

If it's a family home, hide away all baby paraphernalia, it makes people think 'ah they are moving because it's too small now they have kids, so it won't be any good for us either'.

I'm not particularly bothered about general paraphernalia unless the house is particularly cluttered. Normal photos with good lighting are fine.

I've seen some truly terrible photos on rightmove and I'm always amazed that the seller doesn't check their own listing and shoot their estate agent.
e.g. Taking a photo in portrait mode and then stretching it into landscape mode for rightmove, it doesn't make the room look bigger, it just looks like a crappy stretched photo.
Or taking a photo where the side of a fridge or similar object obscures a third of the frame, if you can't get a good angle to show the whole of the room take 2 photos instead.

Like others have said, room sizes and a floorplan (preferably one where what's drawn has a vague relation to actual room sizes not just positions) are equally as important.

Turn on every light in the house, including table lamps etc....

remove every book from bookshelves that can't fit straight upright (if you're like us and have tons of books shoved horizontally on top of other books when we've run out of space)

Remove most small ornaments, they don't show up on pictures anyway

Hide your wheelie bin.

Not sure that it comes with a floor plan ... I wonder if they could include. The room dimensions are given for every room though. Busy taking down all the dc pictures at the moment. I fear there may be much shuffling of stuff from one side of the room to the other when the photographer is here ...

I find it rather annoying when people put on pretentious pseudo-arty photos, e.g zoom in of flowers on the window sill or a room shot at a whimsical angle. It does not tell me anything about the house and makes me think it's a distracting tactic.

Agree with Lalalonglegs that floor-plans are much more informative.

Try to fit in as much of the room as you can - so many times I've looked at photos of the main bedroom and thought "this is just a photograph of a bed".

Something that helped sell my current house to me was a photo taken from an upstairs window, looking out across the back garden. It gave me a great sense of "wow, great view" coupled with a good look at the garden!

WW - are you implying my beds aren't always perfectly aligned every day of the week !?

I can't bear those arty-farty pictures that actually contribute nothing to the particulars - you know, the corner of a window frame, or a close up of a vase of flowers (that won't be staying in the property anyway!).

I like to see pictures that give an idea of the dimensions of a room, the layout, the light and space.

I also dislike photos full of clutter and personal belongings - if I want to view a house I want to get an idea of the rooms, not the stuff in them.