Viewing your Property Through a Camera's Eye

The final installment of this series: 

And photographs have other uses, too. While photographs themselves are placed front and center in advertising to sell your home, any photos, even amateur ones, have a deeper purpose – they can help you see what others are seeing. With the ease of digital photography, you can use your camera to help you hone your eye for the great and not-so-great aspects of the home and property you are seeking to sell.

This second use of photography is designed to help you see your property in multiple ways: as someone who loves it, and as someone who is seeing it for the first time, and as someone who is critical of it. For you, seeing it “new” might be a hard thing to do, but this is exactly the view that the prospective buyer has, and so it is in your best interest to walk into and through your home with this experience in mind. Using photographs in the early stages of readying your home to sell can be as way to prioritize your “to do” list.

The viewfinder or small screen of your camera is a tool that can help you gain that necessary fresh perspective. Looking through a viewfinder, or framing a photograph in the small screen of a camera is key – what details to keep, what to focus on, what to throw away? Photographers constantly ask themselves these questions as they look through the lens, and all three elements are helpful in re-seeing the home and property that you are selling.

Try going through the list of must-have photographs. Take your camera and walk through your home and around your property. Then go and take every photo you can imagine. Take every room in the house, take a photo looking out every window, and take a photo of the walkway up to the front door, another of the garage doors, and look at details through the eyes of the camera.

Try taking photos at different times of day, in different seasons, if possible, and in different weather conditions. Note the light at different times of days and seasons, how the landscaping flatters or detracts from the house, and if there are elements of the home or property that might be out of proportion or place – especially if they might be easily fixed.

Get very close up: Outside the home get details of walkways and steps, foundation, decks and windows. Take photographs that show the condition, the materials, improvements, flaws, potential hazards or issues with lighting, style or architectural or landscaping details. Inside the home look at banisters, window details, fireplaces, hearths, cabinets, molding and door details, light fixtures, heating vents, walls, paint or wallpaper condition, flooring, stairs and landings, and other details.

Get mid-range photos: Back up a bit and get the bigger picture. Outside the home you are seeking to get photos from the driveway and from the curb, as well as standing at the edges of the property from all sides. Inside the home, try standing in the far corners of the room and down the hall, to feel the approach to a room and the feeling of leaving one room to go to the next. Note if you are challenged with long hallways or other architectural issues and consider ways to improve how they show or even use them to your advantage. Pay attention to the paint, windows, screens, shutters, roof and look for any improvements or issues that a potential buyer might raise.

Get the first glimpse photo: That’s the photo where you can first see the house from a distance. This will be your least useful photo, but it is the first thing that might be seen, so you should know what that feels like. If you have a lot of foliage blocking that view, ask yourself is this in keeping with the neighborhood or the image you are crafting for your home.

Consider printing these photographs out and making an album or putting them on a large board. Additionally, online tools such as Pinterest, Facebook, Flickr or others can enable you to organize, share, track them and to get feedback. Note how they make you and others feel, and immediately create a list of items that are positive, negative, and possible to change easily.

This simple exercise of using your own camera, if done in the early stages of readying your home and property to sell, can give you an edge as a seller. An ability to gain a distance and dispassionate view of the home will enable you to be more aware of and in control regarding the property that you are selling. And with that aim, using photography to your advantage is definitely an art to learn.