Alright so in this week’s video we are going to discuss the importance of hiring a professional photographer when you are selling your Myrtle Beach home. Most of the people who are looking to buy a home here in Myrtle Beach are not here locally. What I’ve seen from my 17 years in the business is that our biggest group of people buying a home in Myrtle Beach are from the northeast. That means that most of our buyers are starting the home search from a computer several hundreds of miles away, or they know what they are looking for and are just waiting for that property to come on the market and purchase. But since they are 500 miles away, they are not actively walking through a home here, they have an agent here locally set up a search to notify them when a property comes on the market.
I’ve got several clients that are like this. They might be interested in a gated home in Myrtle Beach, and so they get notified every time a new listing comes on the market. These buyers might receive several email notices a day as there are several communities in the area that are gated, and they cannot jump in the car and come every moment a new listing hits the market. So these types of clients have to rely on the images that the listing agent takes to determine whether they want to make a trip down and view the property.
While more and more agents in the area are starting to use a photographer to get images of their listings, some of the agents here in Myrtle Beach are not going to hire someone. They are either using their own cameras or even worse, maybe a cell phone to take your pictures for your house. When you list your home for sale, if you see the agent pull out their cell phone to take your photos, you need to question them and ask why they are not going to hire someone to give you the best images of your home to attract more potential buyers.
Up until about six or seven months ago I was taking all my photography myself. I have all the professional equipment, I use it to shoot my videos, and so for me it’s not a big deal to go into a listing and take my own images. I’ve spent thousands of dollars over the years on gear and really enjoyed doing the photos. However, I recently had a unit that was a little bit higher end property and so I thought, I should probably hire this out because I don’t have all the exact equipment to get these images the way they need to be. In order to get best photos, you sometimes need better equipment like lighting, wide angle lenses and much more. The better quality gear that you normally need to take this kind of photos can cost you several thousands per piece and well, while I’ve spent a bunch on gear, I also have three kids, so I can’t always purchase the top of the line stuff.
So I decided to reach out to a photographer, hire them, have them take the pictures of my listing. The results that I got were amazing. And it helped to get the property sold within the first week of it being on the market. This listing was in a neighborhood where there were several other homes for sale, and ours was on the higher end of the price scale. The thing that gave our property the competitive advantage over the competition was that we had professional images that the other listings didn’t have. That is why at that point, I decided that I was going to from now on hire a professional photographer for these things. Yes, it’s an expense to me as an agent, but, it allows me to focus on what I like doing most, selling your property.
When I used to take the photos for my listings I was spending anywhere from 4-8 hours taking the photos, editing them and getting everything ready for use. It was a major use of my time and took entirely too much away from other items I could do instead. By hiring the photographer, it freed me up to start other parts of the listing process and now allows me to get the home on the market and get it exposed out to my personal online network of over 40,000 in quicker time, hence getting properties viewed by more people sooner.
I recently had a listing that just went under contract this past week where I hired a professional photographer, to take the photos of this oceanview condo. The unit next door to us had an agent that listed it several months ago, they took the pictures themself, looks like they did it with their cell phone, they are not very good quality. This is a unit that is right by the ocean, so you would think an important to show off would be the ocean views. Well, they took the pictures at night, never went back took pictures to show the view that this unit has. So, instead of showcasing the ocean view, it had a black image on the deck showing a closet.
I listed my unit for sale, instantly had activity on the property. I have a contract on that property right now from a buyer who saw the images online, they’re up in New York, haven’t even been yet to see the unit, but they knew they didn’t want to miss out, so they wrote an offer sight unseen on this property. The agent told me your images were so beautiful, that’s what sold this person on it. Meanwhile, that other unit is still sitting on the market, and it probably will for a little while longer.
So, when you list your Myrtle Beach home for sale, make sure you ask your agent, if they are going to hire a professional photographer to take the pictures of your property. It’s a really important thing to help give you the competitive advantage today over everything else that is on the market. If you have somebody who is not using a professional photographer versus us who are, they are going to lose out on a regular basis. If you would like to get learn more tips on selling your Myrtle Beach home, feel free to call me at 843-222-9402 or simply contact me here.
One of the first questions I try to ask when working with someone buying a home in Myrtle Beach is if they want to live in a community with an homeowner’s association (HOA) or not. Why? Because I would imagine more than half of the communities in the Myrtle Beach area now have some sort of association. To some this is a great thing, to others, they hate the idea of having a board tell them what they can and cannot do with their property.
Animals- As crazy as this sounds, there have been several cases where people want to have chickens, roosters, goats and other animals in their back yard. Some may enjoy being awakened every morning by a rooster, but others would not. In a neighborhood with an HOA in place, these types of things would be regulated and you wouldn’t have to worry about the goat from next door getting into your back yard and consuming your gardenias.
2. Restrictions on landscape & fences- Many of the HOA’s restrict what type of fence you are allowed to install and also require approval to make changes to your landscape. (removing a tree, planting new bushes, etc.) Remember, the HOA is trying to keep a certain standard throughout the community, so in order to do that, they must regulate what happens with everything including tree removal.
