Landlord Guide On Professional Property Photography

Table of contents:

• Using poor images will kill enquiries!
• My letting agent took shit photos of my property!
• Experiment: do I need good/professional images for property adverts?
• Case study: the power of using professional photography for property adverts
• You don’t NEED a professional photographer, but it’s a wise investment!
• Where & how to get Professional Property Photos
• Let’s not forget, beauty is relative!
• Word of warning: don’t be misleading!

Using poor images will kill enquiries!

Exhibit A: Terrible marketing image to entice tenants

An actual image used to market a property. Corner of a room, with a laminate wall… brilliant. ​​​​​​​It was shared by a baffled prospective tenant on Twitter

Poor thing, desperately making it clear it’s not her property. And who can blame her?

The worrying thing is, there is someone out there, whom is presumably very dangerous, that believes that image is fit for purpose. The presumption is, that person believes that image is useful, and optimised to generate enquiries, as opposed to scaring the shit out of someone.

Like I said, monkey.

The all-too-common practice of supplying insufficient images is truly baffling. Please stop it if you’re guilty. Right now. Because there really is no excuse for it, and it’s extremely damaging:

• Unsightly images repel interest (as ‘Exhibit A’ demonstrated). Good images generate more enquiries, and more enquiries equate to shorter void periods, which ultimately means big savings!
• Poor presentation will attract poor quality tenants. If you’re selling a mess, what kind of tenants do you think you’ll attract?
• One of the most damaging costs incurred by landlords is during vacant periods (i.e. in-between tenancies); those periods can give be soul-destroying, because unfortunately, the overheads continue while the money isn’t coming in. But unlike other expenses, like mortgage payments and insurance policies, ‘void periods’ and the associated costs can be easily squashed, and that’s usually done by using the best practices to find tenants efficiently. Using good photography is one of those best practises, of course.
• Many landlords seem to forget they’re trying to sell an extremely expensive product, yet they market their property like they’re selling peanuts.

I believe using good images is 1) one of the easiest to implement 2) one of the most effective methods of generating enquiries 3) often naively overlooked and underestimated.

My letting agent took shit photos of my property!

Most landlords will use some form of letting agent to find tenants, whether it be an online agent or a traditional high-street agent.

As far as I’m concerned, the agent is doing their client (the landlord) a disservice by advertising their property without efficient images…

*slaps forehead*

However, just as equally, the landlord has to take the fair share of the blame for allowing poor images – or even worse, a total lack of images – to represent their offer. But bear in mind, poor photography will hit the landlord’s pocket the hardest, not the agents. Regardless of who’s responsible, just ensure you’re using high-quality images.

If you are paying a high-street agent to find tenants for you, ensure they take high-quality and compelling images which will sell your property! Get your moneys worth.

Do NOT allow your advert to go live on any of the major portals without decent pictures, because you may miss out on enquires, especially if the property listings are ordered by ‘date added’, which is a commonly applied ‘sort’ filter.

Experiment: do I need good/professional images for property adverts?

Short answer: hell yes!

Long answer…

I did a little experiment, didn’t I?

I didn’t really do it to prove that a listing with images works better than one without, because that’s a no-brainer. It’s more of a case of identifying how imperative images are.

I marketed 3 different properties simultaneously on Gumtree. The properties were all similar in size, location, description and price. The only difference between the three campaigns was the use of images, and a slight shuffle of the descriptions so no one smells a rat.

The idea is to monitor which campaign gets the most enquiries and page views. The results should give us a good indication of which campaign is most effective. I gathered the data after the properties had been listed for a week.

Property 1 – used 3 clear pictures of the outside and inside of the property

Property 2 – only used 1 relatively clear, but small front view picture of the property

Property 3 – no pictures used

Properties in search results

This is what the search results looked like when I searched for properties available for rent in “Harlow”.

Gumtree search results are displayed in order of listing age (newest to oldest) by default, and because I added the properties all with in minutes of one another, they appear together in the search results. Which actually makes sense, because the chances of someone else posting an advert for a flat available to rent in Harlow with in the same 3 minutes as me would have extremely narrow.

Experiment Results

Conclusion

Ok, the data sample is woefully pitiful and the experiment was undeniably and embarrassingly basic, but there’s enough meat on the bone (just about) to walk away with some useful information.

Property 1, the one with multiple images, received over 50% more enquiries than the other properties. However, what’s interesting is that Property 2 received the most page views. Can anyone guess why?

I think it’s safe to assume that happened because Property 2 is listed higher up the search results than Property 1. I didn’t intentionally plan that; it was completely random that I submitted property 2 after property 1 (as I mentioned, Gumtree, by default, shows results ordered by age – newest to oldest). I wasn’t actually anticipating that to highlight in the experiment results because I didn’t think one place would make much difference, but apparently it does. But positioning isn’t the most important factor here, because Property 3 is at the top of the pile and it still received the lowest about of page views…why? It had no images. It lacked incentive for users.

So basically, based on this flimsy experiment, the oh-so-obvious conclusion is: in order to receive the most amount of enquiries, your advert should have multiple images.

Case study: the power of using professional photography for property adverts

Ok, so we’ve established that adding images alone make a big difference. But obviously any old images won’t suffice; they need to be good and relevant images. Operative words being “good” and “relevant”

Exhibit B: Creepy & irrelevant marketing image

This was used to market a property. Source: terriblerealestateagentphotos.com

What the-actual-fuck! How creepy is that?!

Perhaps I’m slapping most of you around with an obvious-stick here, for that I apologise, because I’m sure you wouldn’t even attempt to market your property with creepy-ass images of your loved ones.

Let me show you the results of a case study (one which I swiped from the chaps over at Upad.co.uk with their permission, of course)…

Here are some images a landlord used to market his vacant two bedroom property in West London, on Upad (UK’s biggest Online Letting Agent):

Poor composition, bad lighting, wonky, and blurry as hell. Basically, they’re ridiculous. Waste of time.

Despite being in a busy rental market and being competitively priced, the property received no enquiries in the first week. There’s no real surprise there.

The landlord eventually cottoned on (after careful nudging from Upad) that his terrible photography might be the root problem. He decided to get some professional photographs taken. Here are the after shots…

Professional photography by Upad

Better, huh? Amazing how much difference good lighting, a steady hand, good composition and a wide angle lens can make. Now the landlord is SELLING.

The result of Using Professional Photos

Within seven days of adding the new photos he had received ten tenant enquiries for the property and found a professional tenant at the asking rental price.

Good photography is an investment, don’t go without!

You don’t NEED a professional photographer, but it’s a wise investment

You don’t need to be a professional photographer to take good pictures. If you have half a decent camera and lens, and a good eye for design/detail, you can pull it off.

Here are a few tips to taking good quality photos (in case you feel you’re up for the challenge):

• Use a wide angle lens, they are essential for capturing the full view of rooms
• Don’t use a phone camera, even the best of them won’t compare to the results a high-end DSLR camera can produce
• Take the pictures in daylight
• Make sure the rooms/property is well presented e.g. clean, uncluttered and tidy
• I don’t think staging/props (e.g. furnishings) are essential as long as you can show the space available, but they can help prospective tenant’s visualise how the space can be used
• Bathrooms and kitchens tend to do most of the selling

However, it’s important to accept defeat if you don’t have a creative bone in your body, because bodge-jobs will cost you more. Most people wrongly believe they have a good eye for design, and that’s probably half of the problem.

Where & how to get Professional Property Photos

Professional Property Photography & Floorplans

Supplier	Price	Notes / Includes
Supplier	Price £99Inc VAT	Notes / Includes Property Photography Up to 10 high-quality photos Helps grab online attention You own the photographs 48 hour delivery turnaround	More Info
Supplier	Price £69Inc VAT	Notes / Includes Professional Floor Plans Includes room measurements Helps tenants visualise Recommended for larger homes Free amendments	More Info

Let’s not forget, beauty is relative!

What I mean by that is, if you have a property that’s realistically going to achieve £200PCM, then spending £99 on professional photos probably wouldn’t be a wise investment. The reality is, prospective tenants won’t be expecting much in return for £200PCM- they definitely won’t be expecting glossy images of a show home. That said, no matter what the value of your property, ALWAYS post clear and useful images, with or without professional photography.

Word of warning: don’t be misleading!

I want to end this blog post with a dose of reality!

I want to clarify the difference between showing a clear picture of your property and misleading your prospective clients with an idea that isn’t real. The key point about using high quality pictures is to show your property in its best light and highlighting the key features. If you fall into the trap of over-staging and falsely heightening the appeal of your property, you may end up wasting everyone’s time. Show what you’re selling in all its glory, but don’t try to sell something you don’t have for sale.

Hope this has been useful… to someone!