About 45 percent of home sales offered in the last year were made sight unseen. That means nearly half of new homeowners never stepped foot inside their new home.
This is a shocking number, and it reveals that the way people are buying homes is changing and changing fast. Sight unseen offers are expected to only continue to rise as technology makes the home buying process more accessible and seamless than ever before.
Whether you are a real estate agent, broker, first time home buyer, or are looking to sell your home fast, it is important that you know how drone footage is changing the home buying process.
We have outlined some of the best tips and tricks for incorporating drone footage into your real estate listings. Keep reading to learn how to use it to your advantage and get the most money out of your home.
Is Drone Footage Really Necessary for Real Estate Listings?
Yes. Drone footage is really necessary if you want your real estate listing to stand out from the sea of endless competition. If you are still on the fence about using aerial drone footage when selling a house, continue reading for more facts.
Over 80 percent of home sellers choose to work with agents who use drones to create video marketing materials for their house. More expensive homes have been shown to use aerial drone footage in their advertising more often than homes that are not as costly.
Therefore, it is fairly reasonable to conclude that using drone footage can help sell your home faster and can even help increase the selling price of your home.
There are many additional benefits to using drone footage in your real estate listing from a business perspective. Drone footage can help boost your website traffic and help you rank higher than your competition on search engines.
Reaching more people through real estate search engines could be a major game changer. It could mean the difference between your home getting sold and sitting on the market for months.
How to Shoot the Best Drone Footage Ever
Shooting the best drone footage ever starts with using a high-quality drone that will get the job done. You can either own or rent a drone. Take time and research what the best drones are for real estate purposes. Read reviews on what other realtors have bought and liked.
You should be aware that to fly a drone in the United States, you must be licensed through the FAA. Testing is rigorous, and there is a fee that is involved. You must also be very aware of the FAA guidelines in regards to air space before operating your drone. Homes close to airports, airfields, or government buildings have special restrictions about drone usage.
If you are not interested in owning or operating a drone, there is still a way for you to capitalize on the drone footage trend. There are freelance drone pilots available as well as companies like Hommati. The benefit of using Hommati is that in addition to being fully licensed, their pilots specialize in real estate aerial drone video. Hommati also offers additional services that will help you sell your house.
Best Tips for Hiring a Drone Pilot
If you are thinking about hiring a drone pilot to help you shoot your best drone footage ever, be sure to ask them several important questions.
- Will they own the video footage, or will you own the copyright?
- What sort of credit would you need to give the drone videographer in the footage?
- Will they edit the drone footage for you, or will they give you the raw, unedited footage?
- How many rounds of edits will you get?
Hiring a drone videographer can be a great option for those unfamiliar with operating drones but still want to use drone footage in their real estate marketing materials.
How to Edit Drone Footage
Say you purchased your drone, passed the FAA testing, and are ready to get to work filming. Congratulations! You are one step closer to elevating your real estate listing above the competition.
But now comes the hard part. You have to cut and edit your drone footage in such a way to be something a potential home buyer wants to watch.
There are several important steps when it comes to editing your drone footage. Capture the most eye-catching, sell-worthy portions of the property and house. This is your chance to really wow a potential home buyer.
Do not spend too long on one type of shot. One scene should not last more than 10 to 15 seconds. Keep the video moving quickly enough where viewers are not becoming bored and will exit the video.
However, do not speed over the parts that viewers would be the most interested in, whether it be the backyard or pool. If you are a real estate agent, work with the homeowner to make sure you capture the parts of the property that you really want to highlight.
If you are using a drone videographer and they are editing the footage for you, make sure to communicate to them exactly what you are looking for when it comes to your aerial drone footage.
Hommati completes all of the editing of their aerial drone footage for you and will deliver video you can use to market wherever you want. They also provide MLS compliant video links that can be uploaded and shared to your website. Since they specialize in real estate aerial video and more, they have a full understanding as to what is needed.
When using a company like Hommati, you can rely on their professional drone pilot to already know exactly what is needed to provide the aerial drone video that highlights the property and that will engage the viewers as well as hold their attention.
How to Use Free Music for Drone Footage
Music can help put a certain mood or vibe in the home buyer's mind when looking at drone footage of your real estate listing.
You may be tempted to add in your Top 40 favorite or a classic rock jam that is a total crowd pleaser to really make your video pop, but you want to avoid doing this at all costs.
When looking to add music to your real estate listing video, it is critical that you use royalty free music for drone footage. There are several royalty free music sites to choose from.
If you do not use royalty free music, you can get hit with a cease and desist notice from a recording company.
If you post your drone footage to a site like YouTube, you can get a strike against your profile or even have your video taken down. YouTube could also mute your video, so there is no music playing whatsoever. There is nothing worse than a three minute long video of total silence.
Using royalty free music for drone footage on real estate listings will keep you on a good legal footing. It will also help keep your video working smoothly for everyone who views it.
Hommati adds music from their royalty free collection of instrumental songs. With Hommati, there are no worries that the music will cause any issues.
Is 4K Drone Footage Worth It for Real Estate Listings?
Video pixilation is something to consider when deciding what type of drone to shoot with. Some may say that standard 1080p could be good enough for shooting drone footage, but that may not be the best option for your real estate video.
When a drone is flying high over your house and property, there are a lot of details to capture. Shooting drone footage in standard 1080p from high up over the property risks not capturing all the unique details of the house.
4K drone footage can make even ordinary seeming video footage become extraordinary. Shooting drone footage in 4K is recommended for those properties and homes where you want to make an impact.
All of Hommati's aerial drone video is 4K, and their professional pilots understand which filters to use to best capture a home even when the available day light might not be ideal.
Benefits of Using Drone Footage in Your Marketing
We already found out that home sellers favor working with real estate agents who use drone footage and that homes that use aerial footage sell faster than those that do not, but how does drone footage help you as a real estate agent or brokerage firm with your marketing?
There are some common marketing mistakes that real estate agents make all the time, but drone footage can help you avoid some of them.
Using drone video footage in your marketing emails and digital presence helps to elevate you above the competition.
Emails with the word "video" in the subject line have higher open rates than those that do not. Emails that have videos in the body of the copy have higher click-through rates than emails that do not.
It becomes a no brainer to start using drone footage in all of your marketing emails, because having a video in the content sells.
Reach Out to Us to Boost Your Real Estate Listing
Drone footage is the future of real estate listings. Houses that use video in their marketing receive four times more the amount of inquiries than homes that do not make use of drone footage.
If you are a homeowner who is serious about selling your home fast or increasing the amount of homes you are selling as a real estate agent, start using drone footage today. You will start seeing results right off the bat.
If you are interested in boosting your real estate listing and creating buss around your home on the market, reach out to us today. Our team is ready to help you sell your home for top dollar.