Selling
Preparing your home for listing photos
A practical room-by-room plan for getting ready for photography.
By Ramsey Stewart · Published
The night before listing photos, the temptation is to clean everything at once. I’d start with a simpler test. Stand in the doorway of your living room and take a picture with your phone. What do you notice first? If it’s a pile of mail or a tangle of cords, you’ve just found your first job.
A camera makes small distractions easy to spot. You can get a lot done in an evening by working through the rooms in the order a buyer might see them.
Start at the front door
Walk up from the street the way a visitor would. Sweep the steps, coil the hose and move the trash bins out of view. If you have a porch, leave enough space around the furniture to show how someone could sit there. On photo day, park away from the front of the house if you have another spot available.
Do the same walk outside around the back. A clear path to a patio or deck helps buyers see how that outdoor space connects to the house. Move tools and toys into storage, and give the outdoor table a quick wipe.
Give the kitchen and living room some breathing room
In the kitchen, clear dishes from the sink, take personal papers off the fridge and put away the small appliances you can live without for a day. Leave a little space around anything you keep out. If the counters feel crowded in your phone photo, move one more thing.
In the living room, check the main walkways. A basket of toys or an extra side table might be perfectly useful on a Tuesday night and still make the room look tighter in a photo. Move it out for the shoot and straighten the cushions. Take another picture from the doorway and see whether the layout is easier to read.
Make bedrooms and bathrooms easy to photograph
Make the beds and clear the tops of dressers and nightstands. Look for charging cords, medicine bottles and anything with a name or address on it. Set aside valuables and paperwork somewhere secure before the photographer arrives.
In bathrooms, put away toothbrushes, bath products and cleaning supplies. Hang a clean towel, wipe mirrors and counters, and check the shower for items you can tuck away. A laundry basket you can carry from room to room makes this last pass quicker. Move it to a spot you’ve confirmed won’t be photographed.
Plan the morning before it arrives
Ask which rooms and exterior features the photographer expects to cover. That gives you time to decide where the dog will go, move vehicles, and finish any spaces you were tempted to use for temporary storage. If the weather looks unsettled, ask how we’ll handle the outdoor photos.
If you only have twenty minutes left, clear the kitchen counters, check the front entry and put away personal items. Those are three tasks you can finish without starting a project you’ll be stuck with when the doorbell rings. If you’re getting ready to sell and want a second set of eyes, we can walk through the house together and decide what’s worth doing before photo day.
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