Photoshopped Real Estate Listings

Got a dingy house in need of a paint job, new roof, and a new lawn? Easy, just a few minutes in Photoshop and Presto-Chango, it’s move-in ready!

With more consumers going online to do their home searches, it is now more important for sellers and agents to be able to draw a home-buyer with just one simple, small picture of a home than ever before. So much so, in fact, that quite a few are now relying on Photoshop to give their properties the competitive edge online.

Done right, these digital make-overs can give home buyers an idea of how a house could look, influencing them to buy. But, they shouldn’t be the first images that they see and they certainly shouldn’t be presented as genuine photos of a residence. Ultimately, doing so will affect an agent’s credibility when they take an excited couple to see a house, only to discover all the flaws that were hidden in the picture.

Example

Here’s an example of one I found on FMLS. It’s a small 3/1 home in Acworth, GA. Nice lawn eh?

Most of you can probably tell the grass is fake on the above. But, it’s just one of many that are out there. I’ve seen much better ones. Here’s the same image after I’ve done my own editing on it in Photoshop:

Not as easy to notice now is it? And that only took about 15mins.

So, what are some things to look for?

• Repeating patterns – Often the clone tool is used to copy a good section of the photo over a bad section. However, sloppiness with this tool can lead to patterns that are easy to detect.
• Shading – A flat lawn is a fake lawn.
• Texture – If it doesn’t look like it has the right texture to it, it probably doesn’t.
• Straight Lines -Razor-sharp lines only exist in the digital world and Superman’s jawline. Grass leaves a fuzzy edge.
• Wrong Color – Grass is green…but not that green. Many people think they can just paint some green over a lawn and expect it to look right…wrong. Lawns have texture and they have multiple shades of green.
• Brightness – Another trick is to grab objects from other photos to correct something in an existing one. However, the new objects are often not color corrected before being used. So, they end up with some things that visually stick out of the photo.