What’s Wrong With The House?
March 23, 2009 by By Owner University
Filed under Marketing
With more and more home buyers searching online, you’ll find that the first contact they have with your property is your online marketing. What they really want to see is a picture. Hopefully it’s a good one. Curb appeal applies here, because it doesn’t matter what you have written. Your picture is going to create that all important first impression. Both of these pictures are good photos for marketing, unless of course it’s not the middle of winter, or summer. Right now the snow is mostly gone and the first signs of Spring are appearing. Buyers looking at the photo of your home are going to be able to tell what season it was taken in and that will give them an idea of how long your home has been on the market. Market time is a handy thing for buyers to know. It gives them an approximate measure of how desperate you might be. When you are listed on the Multiple Listing, this information is available to agents.
You have an advantage when you are marketing by owner, because this information is only available if you give it out. Many people don’t realize they are advertising their market time with an out of season photo. Sometimes, you don’t even intend to give the wrong impression. When homes go on the market in the winter, I often see a cheery summer picture submitted for the main website photo. It’s good to be thinking in those kind of marketing terms, but think like a buyer. When they see an obviously out of season photo, they don’t think about how nice the yard will look when the snow melts, they wonder what’s wrong with the house that it’s been on the market since last summer and hasn’t sold yet? Does a major flaw show up in the home inspection? Is it overpriced? Are the owners difficult to work with?
By keeping your advertising fresh and seasonal, you eliminate that negative impression you may not want to be giving. Even when the grass is brown and the trees have no leaves, it’s possible to get that all important splash of color. There’s a few tips in our course on Marketing in the Winter. We’ve also got a course in the works on photographing your home. Watch for it coming soon on the courses page in the Student Resources section of the By Owner University website.
