Real Estate Photography Checklist for Sellers

Counters and blinds. If you do nothing else on this list, do those two.

This real estate photography checklist is the list we want in a seller’s hands before our photographer arrives at a rowhouse in Baltimore or an apartment in Queens. Agents can hand it to their sellers, and short-term rental hosts use a version of it with a few rooms flipped. It’s the prep side of the job, the part that happens before the camera comes out of the bag. HDR photography starts at $200 for a home up to 1,500 square feet, and a $200 shoot of a house that’s ready beats a bigger shoot of a house that isn’t.

We were named a local expert on Redfin, a subsidiary of Rocket. Read the full article here: How to Prep Your Home for a Photo Shoot: Tips from the Pros

The 30-minute real estate photography checklist

Say the shoot is tomorrow morning and you have half an hour tonight. Skip the closets and go in this order.

• Counters. Every flat surface in the kitchen and the bathrooms gets cleared. Coffee maker, dish rack, paper towels, soap bottles, toothbrushes. Into a cabinet, not shoved to one end.
• Blinds. Every blind in the house raised to the same height, with the slats tilted the same way. Halfway up on one window and closed on the next is the first thing the camera sees.
• Lights. Every lamp and every overhead on. Under-cabinet lights, the range hood light, the closet light if the door is open. A dead bulb gets replaced tonight.
• Cars. Out of the driveway and off the curb in front of the house.
• Bins. Trash and recycling around the side or in the garage. Coil the hose while you’re out there.
• Pets. Out of the house before the photographer arrives, and the bowls, the bed and the litter box go with them.

That’s the same list we gave Redfin when they asked what a seller should do before the photographer shows up:

“Prep is mostly subtraction. Pull cars out of the driveway, hide trash bins, coil the hose, and take the magnets off the fridge. Turn on every lamp and overhead light and open all the blinds to the same height, since mismatched blinds are the single most common thing we end up fixing in post. Have pets and their bowls, beds, and litter boxes out of the house before we arrive, not moved room to room while we shoot. If you do nothing else, do the counters and the blinds. That makes most of the difference between a listing that scrolls past and one that gets saved.”

Willis Aybar, co-owner of OpenDoors360, quoted in Redfin

South Hanover Street in Baltimore, and the living room is the 30-minute list done. The shutters on both front windows are set to the same angle. The fan is off, so the blades are sharp. The TV is showing a still landscape, which is the alternative to a black rectangle on a brick wall, and there’s nothing on the coffee table.

Real estate photography checklist, room by room

The long version, for the night before. Work top to bottom in each room, and use your phone. Take a picture from the doorway, then look at the picture. The phone shows you what the listing photo will show a buyer, and it catches the tissue box your eye stopped seeing months ago.

Entry

• Shoes, umbrellas, the mail pile and the dog leash off the hook.
• Coats down to one or two, or none.
• Floor mats up. A real area rug that belongs in the space can stay.
• Front door glass cleaned, porch light on.

Living room

• Remotes, cords and chargers hidden. A cord running across the floor to a lamp gets tucked behind the furniture.
• The TV off, or left on a still image. A black screen reads as a hole in the wall and a live broadcast ghosts in the blend.
• Ceiling fans off. Blades that move between exposures smear across the blend.
• Throws folded, pillows squared, magazines down to one.
• Blinds and curtains at the same height and tilt on every window in the room.
• Family photos are your call. The camera doesn’t care, and some sellers would rather not have their kids on the MLS.

Kitchen

• Counters clear. Coffee maker, toaster, knife block, dish rack, paper towel holder, the soap by the sink. One bowl of fruit or one plant is plenty.
• Fridge front bare. Magnets, photos, the school calendar.
• Sink empty, the drying rack put away, the dish towel off the oven handle.
• Trash can out of sight.
• Under-cabinet lights on, range hood light on.
• Stovetop clean and nothing on the burners.

Same house on South Hanover. The coffee maker on the left counter, the dish rack by the sink, the towel on the oven handle and the paper towels are exactly what the kitchen list above takes out for a sale listing. In a rental listing they’d stay, since a guest is shopping for what’s there to use. For a sale, they go in a cabinet until the photographer leaves.

Dining room

• Table cleared, or set simply. Placemats and plates, and nothing in the glasses.
• Chairs pushed in and spaced evenly.
• One centerpiece, low enough to see across.
• Chandelier on, with every bulb in it working.

Aisquith Street in Baltimore. Four place settings, one plant in the middle, chairs pushed in, chandelier on with every bulb lit. A table set like this takes ten minutes and reads as a room people eat in.

Bedrooms

• Bed made tight. Duvet pulled square, pillows stacked or lined up.
• Nightstands down to a lamp and one object.
• Closet doors closed, dresser top down to a lamp.
• Laundry basket out of the room.
• Phone chargers and the alarm clock cord tucked behind the nightstand.
• Blinds matched, lamps on.

Bathrooms

• Toilet lid down. Every time.
• Counter clear. Toothbrushes, razors, the soap dispenser, the hair dryer. One folded towel is fine.
• Bath mats and the toilet rug up. Towels off the hooks or hung straight, one per bar.
• Shower curtain fully open or fully closed. Halfway reads as a mistake.
• Shampoo bottles out of the shower, or lined up in a corner the lens can’t reach.
• Trash can, plunger, toilet brush and scale out of the room.
• Mirror wiped, vanity light on.

Office

• Desk down to the monitor, the keyboard and a lamp.
• Cables behind the desk, the power strip out of sight.
• Paper off the desk and off the floor.
• Chair pushed in.

Laundry room

• Machines empty and closed, nothing on top.
• Detergent in a cabinet.
• Folding surface cleared.

Basement and garage

• Floor cleared down the middle so there’s a path for the camera.
• Cars out of the garage if the garage is being photographed.
• Storage pushed to the walls and stacked.
• Every light on, bare bulbs included. A finished basement gets the full living room list.

A good living room, and it’s in here for three small things. The tissue box on the ottoman, the bag on the floor by the door, and the keys on the wall hook. A phone photo from the doorway would have caught all three in a second, and a buyer’s eye lands on them right after the fireplace.

Outside the house

• Cars out of the driveway and away from the curb in front. A car in the driveway is in every exterior frame.
• Trash and recycling bins to the side of the house or inside the garage.
• Hose coiled, or off the spigot.
• Lawn cut, edges trimmed, leaves raked. If it snowed, the walk and the driveway shoveled before the photographer arrives.
• Porch swept, welcome mat up, the dead plant off the step.
• Kids’ toys, the grill cover and the bag of mulch leaning on the fence put away.
• Porch light on, along with any landscape lights.
• Front windows cleaned, at least the ones facing the street.
• Patio furniture set out with the cushions on. Pool cover off and the pool clean if there is one.

What we fix in editing and what we can’t

Fixable at the desk: a blind that sits a little off from its neighbor, a stray cord, a switch plate missing its cover. Those are routine edits.

Not fixable: a cluttered counter, laundry on the floor, a car in the driveway, an unmade bed. We shoot around them where we can, but anything left in the frame is in the finished photo.

The reason a moving thing can’t be fixed is how the frame is made. Every interior frame is five exposures of the same scene, shot in a burst and blended so the window view and the dark corner both hold detail. Anything that moves between the first exposure and the last shows up in every one of them, faintly. A ceiling fan turns into a gray disc. A cat crossing the hall becomes a ghost of a cat. That’s why the fan goes off and the pets go out.

Virtual staging is for empty rooms. We add furniture to a photo of a bare room at $50 per image, and the virtual staging page covers how the furniture gets into the file. It doesn’t take a pile of laundry out of a full room, and we don’t use it that way.

The camera can't take the coffee maker off the counter. You can.

Day of the shoot

Leave if you can. A seller in the house during the shoot ends up in a doorway in three frames, or moving a chair the photographer just placed. Take the pets with you, and the bowls. If you have to stay, pick a room that’s already been shot and stay in it.

Turn everything on before you go, and leave the blinds where you set them. In a home that isn’t ready, the work that would have gone into shooting goes into moving things instead, and the real estate photography process page covers what to expect from booking to delivery.

For Airbnb and short-term rentals

A rental listing runs the opposite checklist in a few rooms. The coffee maker stays on the counter, and so does the toaster. Set the table. Roll the towels on the bed or stack them in the bathroom. Put the board games on the shelf and the beach chairs by the door if the house is near a beach. The rest holds: counters cleared of anything that’s the host’s and not the guest’s, blinds matched, fan off.

A galley kitchen in a New York City apartment, with the door open to the deck. The paper towel roll on the rail, the coffee maker by the stove and the fire extinguisher on the wall all stay in a rental listing, because a guest wants to know they’re there. Our Airbnb photographers page covers the rental side, and there’s a longer piece on how to photograph a short-term rental that walks the amenities room by room.

Common questions

Should I be home during real estate photos? You don’t need to be home, and it’s easier on everyone if you aren’t. A seller in the house tends to end up in a doorway, or moving something the photographer just set. The agent can let our photographer in, or you can leave a lockbox code. Pets should leave with you, along with their bowls and beds.

Do I need to stage my home before photos? Staging isn’t required for a photo shoot, and a clean, cleared home photographs well without it. Furniture that’s already there works once the clutter is out and the blinds match. Empty rooms are the one case where staging helps, and virtual staging at $50 per image covers those without renting a single chair.

Should the lights be on for real estate photos? Every light in the house should be on, including lamps, under-cabinet lights and the range hood. Our photographer shoots HDR, which blends five exposures, and lit rooms keep their warmth against the window light. Dead bulbs should be replaced the night before, and bulbs in the same room should match in color so one lamp doesn’t read yellow beside a white one.

How long before photos should I clean? A deep clean works best a day or two before the shoot, with a last pass the night before. Floors, mirrors, the glass in the front door and the stovetop all show in the frame. Counters and blinds are the two items to check again the morning of, since the coffee maker tends to come back out after breakfast.

What should I remove from the kitchen before real estate photos? The counters should be down to nothing, or to one bowl of fruit. Coffee maker, toaster, dish rack, knife block, paper towels and the soap by the sink go into a cabinet. Fridge magnets and photos come off the door. The dish towel comes off the oven handle, the sink gets emptied, and the trash can leaves the room.

Booking the shoot

Send the address and the square footage through the contact a real estate photographer page. The rates are on the real estate photography pricing sheet by interior square footage, and the real estate photography services page lists what ships with a shoot. Maryland sellers and agents can see the counties we cover on the real estate photography in Maryland page, and New York readers have the New York real estate photography page for the boroughs, Long Island and Westchester. Do the counters and the blinds before we get there.