Blog - New Interior Solutions

Traditional staging versus virtual staging

Home staging is no longer a new term in the real estate field. Everyone knows what it is. Used for years now, traditional home staging still continues to help selling houses faster and for more money.

Traditional staging is the art of transforming a room (or an entire property) thanks to the use of furniture, color, accessories, etc. in order to increase the potential of a home. It applies to both vacant houses and occupied houses. In the first case the rooms are furnished with furniture and accessories brought in by the staging company, while in the second case the seller’s furniture and accessories are used. For this reason it is also known as redesign.

What is virtual staging?

Virtual staging has the same purpose as traditional staging but it uses new technology to highlight the potential of a property. To this end, it transforms the photographs of a listing by adding virtual furniture and accessories to help the buyer better understand the space and the interiors of a home.

The fundamental difference between the two is therefore in the fact that traditional staging shows a property as it is, while virtual staging shows a property as it could be. Also in terms of cost there is a big difference: traditional staging requires an average investment between $2000 and $5000 (for a medium-sized house), while virtual staging costs around $39 to $100 per image.

The two types of staging have in common the fact that they both offer web appeal and complete the presentation of a listing.

How can you avoid misrepresentation lawsuits related to virtual staging?

When it comes to virtual staging, it is crucial not to give the property a wrong representation. To overcome this problem it is absolutely essential to watermark the photos for transparency.

Here’s an example:

Personally, I always suggest my clients not only to put the disclaimer on the photos, but also to add it in the description of the property. Buyers must know that they will visit either an empty house or a house that is different from the one shown in the photos. What I mean is that sometimes virtual staging is used also to show a possible remodeling. In this case it is better known as virtual remodeling.

Another good idea is to show the original photo of the room and the virtual photo side by side. This video better illustrates the concept:

Absolutely no structural problems or physical damage should be hidden or disguised. This is actually a rule that applies to both traditional staging and real estate photography as well.

I think that in the end traditional staging and virtual staging are two sides of the same coin. Both are intended to show the potential of a property to help the seller understand if it is the right one. They are two different approaches to the same situation. One is more physical and expensive, while the other is more abstract and inexpensive. However, the purpose is the same: to sell a house faster and for more money.

This is why 3D virtual tours should always be offered along with photography when selling a house

Has it ever occurred to you to see the photos of a house, to imagine it one way and then go to see it in person and find out that it is completely different from what you thought? I’m not talking about rooms that are smaller than what they appear to be in an image. This is something that happens quite often since most photographers use wide-angle lenses to capture most of a room. What I’m talking about is the layout of a property. For example, by looking at the photo of a kitchen, you guess that the dining room is adjacent. Or by looking at the photo of a bedroom, you imagine that it is on the upper floor instead of on the lower floor.

Such a thing happened to me every time a real estate agent was sending me the photos of a house for sale whose floor plan was the same as the one I was hired to stage. The purpose of sharing this information was to give me an idea of how the competition staged the neighboring houses. Inevitably, every time I went to visit the soon-to-be property for sale to take photos and start creating the home staging plan, it surprised me how different it was from how I imagined it.

Obviously, the same thing happens to buyers as well, because what you see is not always what you get. This is a typical example of how interior photography, although absolutely indispensable when it comes to selling a house, is not capable of delivering all the information a buyer needs about a property.

Take this townhouse in West Seattle for example.

This townhouse was in a complex where an identical property was already on the market. After seeing the photos of that listing, I imagined that the rooms were structured differently from what they actually were. This is quite common especially when the spaces are so small that it is very hard to convey the information with a static image. Fortunately, my agent was far-sighted and asked me to do a 3D virtual tour of his property on top of the professional photos. And here it is:

The beauty of 3D virtual tours is that nothing is left to the imagination because you can virtually walk inside a house and see everything, even the most hidden corners.

3D virtual tours are a win-win for both sellers and buyers

While real estate photography tells you the story of a house from the most attractive point of view (the goal of every photographer is to produce images that attract the largest number of buyers – as it should be-), 3D virtual tours tell you the same story while maintaining a neutral point of view. This means that they show everything you need to know about a home.

For some realtors this is a problem though. Their objection is that many buyers decide not to visit a home when they realize that it doesn’t offer what they are looking for. This, however, is not a bad thing, on the contrary, it is a very good thing because it auto-select only the buyers who are really interested to see the house in person and eventually make an offer. The result is a considerable time (and stress) saver not only for the buyers and their agent but also for the sellers and their agent. Besides, with each virtual tour it is possible to order a floor plan of the house, which is undoubtedly an added value in terms of marketing and promotion.

For more information on virtual tours visit this page or contact me.

The difference between Real Estate Photography and Interior Photography

You might think that interior photography and real estate photography are the same thing. In reality, despite being part of the same family, they are two different disciplines.

The main goal of real estate photography is to present a property for sale. In a short amount of time, usually a couple of hours, the photographer creates images able to describe a property and its main features. Usually this is done using wide-angle lenses because with a single click it is possible to capture the whole room.

Interior photography, on the other hand, has a very different goal, namely to represent the work of an interior designer, an architect or a home stager. It is also used to create images of furniture, objects, finishes, and so on. For this reason it is more common to see close-up pictures rather than images of an entire room.

Interior photography is an essential marketing tool for the designer who wants to show their projects. It is also important for the architect who wants to emphasize the quality of a built-in piece, for example, or for the home stager who wishes to show prospective clients how they can transform an interior and sell their home faster and for more money. For this reason interior photography (or architectural photography) is very much a teamwork.

Even thought it is always better to hire a professional to take the photos for your portfolio, if you are in a little hurry or simply want a quick (but great) image for a blog post or social media, nowadays with a little knowledge and the right tools you can take incredibly good photos of interiors with your smartphone. Here are some examples:

These photos were taken using an iPhone and were edited with Snapseed, one the best photo editing apps available for both iPhones and androids.

If you would like to learn more about the subject, this mini course will help you learn the tips and tricks of taking beautiful photos of interiors without a professional DSLR, but with a simple smartphone. 60 pages of in-depth information along with 5 explanatory videos will take your smartphone photography to the next level! Besides, if you buy it during the month of November you can also get a 30% discount using this code NOVPROMO-30