Tips For A Great Virtual house Tour

As we go through the third national lockdown and COVID-19 cases remain high, there is a surge in demand for virtual house tours. Buyers, sellers, renters and estate agents are looking to limit personal contact while at the same time offering a viewing experience that is as close to the real thing as possible. If your property is a build to let property in particular you don’t want the hard work that went into the property to go unnoticed and a video tour allows you to really highlight the property and the work completed. 

You can think of a virtual house tour as Google StreetView inside your home.

As shopping online becomes the norm for most of the population, it makes sense to get your home online with more than just a few photos. The cost of technology has dropped significantly, so you can get close to professional quality with a virtual house tour created using a camera or smartphone and an app or software.

 

Why Virtual House Tours Are Important

Selling a house requires you to immerse your potential home buyer so that they can experience the flow and layout of your home. The data backs this up and indicates that a virtual house tour will increase the likelihood of sealing the deal. Virtual house tours during COVID-19 will help your house sell faster, and with as few as one in ten using this method, there is a huge opportunity to make your home stand out from the crowd.

You will save time showing people around your home, hundreds of people can see your house online at once, and you can tap into the out-of-town buyers market. However, this solution should still be seen as an addition to professional photographs. As restrictions dictate, you can create the footage yourself or ask your local realtor to produce an estate agent’s virtual tour for you.

 

A Step By Step Guide

Just like showing your home in person, you should prepare your home before anyone sees it. It helps to give your home a thorough clean, remove personal clutter, touch up paint, and tidy up your garden by removing weeds and mowing the grass.

You will need to select your equipment, which could be your smartphone and an app, which will cost very little, or a 360-degree camera, which is far more affordable than it used to be. The resolution of low-cost cameras is excellent, so you don’t need to spend a fortune if you don’t want to.

Unlike a walkthrough video, you will be capturing a 360-degree view of every space so that the home buyer can pan, freeze, and zoom in as they choose. You should set aside around 20 minutes if you are using a camera or 30 minutes to an hour if you are using a smartphone.

Before you start your virtual house tour, create an image list, and tick them off as you complete them to ensure you don’t overlook a room.

With a 360-degree camera, you will need a tripod set at chest height. To make a great virtual house tour, you need to ensure the camera is level; otherwise, the image will not line up as the viewer pans around.

Take your first shot from across the road, moving next to the front garden and back garden. Then, move inside your home, turn on lights, open all doors, and open curtains and blinds. Place the tripod in the centre of hallways or at the entrance to each room. You can move the tripod to different positions in larger rooms, and you should consider moving the tripod to one corner to show the room’s size.

Depending on the software or app that you have chosen, you may edit the results and upload them to a hosting platform. If you are using an estate agent, they may recommend what software to use, and you will need to provide a link to your content or embedding code, which they will use on their website.

A virtual house tour will help you sell your house fast, and there is no better time than now to grasp this option with both hands.

If you’d like to learn more about the housing market and the finance options available please contact us today.

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