Property Photography With a Phone: The Rules That Matter

Photos decide whether anyone clicks. A well-priced flat with bad photos gets fewer enquiries than an over-priced flat with good ones — which is a problem, because you can fix the photos in an afternoon.

1. Turn every light on, and open every curtain

Even in daylight. Mixed light looks worse than either alone in theory, but in practice a lit room reads as warm and an unlit corner reads as damp. Turn everything on.

2. Shoot from chest height, not eye height

Around 1.2 to 1.4 metres. Eye height makes floors dominate and ceilings shrink. Chest height is what estate photographers use and it is the single fastest improvement available.

3. Keep verticals vertical

Hold the phone straight, not tilted up or down. Tilting makes the walls converge and the room look like it is falling over. Turn on the grid in the camera settings and use it.

4. Shoot from the corner

Stand in a corner and shoot across the room diagonally. You capture two walls and the true depth. Shooting flat at a wall makes any room look like a corridor.

5. Declutter ruthlessly

Remove: shoes, bins, drying racks, wires, toiletries, fridge magnets, cleaning supplies, personal photos, and anything on the kitchen counter that is not decorative.

This is twenty minutes of work and it changes the photos more than any camera setting.

6. Do not use ultra-wide

It is tempting because rooms look enormous. It is also the most common complaint buyers make on site visits — "it looked much bigger in the photos". You lose the trust and you lose the deal, and you wasted a visit.

7. Shoot the whole property, including the ordinary rooms

Missing rooms make buyers assume the worst. A small bathroom photographed honestly costs you nothing; an absent bathroom costs you enquiries from people who assume it is unusable.

8. Get the exterior and the approach

The building, the entrance, the parking, and if it is good, the view from the balcony. Buyers are choosing a location as much as a flat.

Editing, minimally

• Straighten
• Lift the shadows a little
• Correct the white balance so white walls are white
• Nothing else

Do not use HDR filters, do not saturate the sky, do not remove things that exist. Edited-to-fiction photos are a misrepresentation problem, not a style choice.

The order to upload

1. The best room, usually the living room
2. Kitchen
3. Bedrooms, largest first
4. Bathrooms
5. Balcony / view
6. Exterior and common areas

The first photo does most of the work. Pick it deliberately rather than uploading in the order you shot.