Do a Floor Plan; Make Your Client Say “Wow”!

One of the first questions buyers often ask after seeing photos of a house is, “What’s the floor plan like?” A custom 3-D Floor Plan answers that question, and makes buyers say “Wow!”

A 3-D Floor Plan enables a buyer to “move into” your home; they can assign rooms, move their furniture in, and envision a lifestyle – family dinners, birthday parties, barbeques with friends, etc. It lets them see how the individual rooms fit together to form an organic “whole.” And it provides a great outline on our web sites and our flyers…

Every listing I serve has a flyer box out front filled with dual-sided flyers printed on glossy, extra-heavy paper, and featuring full-color photos, a floor plan of the home on the back, and key selling features. The best part of the flyer, though, is the web address to the property’s custom website, where potential buyers can get every last view and detail of your home. Many buyers have started viewing my websites on their internet-connected smart phones from inside their cars in front of the home after getting the website off a flyer from the flyer box.

A 3-D Floor Plan serves as a great tour guide on my custom property websites. When buyers hit the site, they see the layout of your home, and as they click on each room of the floor plan, they are presented with a slide show displaying the room from every angle, and focusing on the special features of the room. At the same time an audio track shares the special features and unique charms of the room. (For an example, go to http://www.2972oldarcataroad.com/)

As buyers view all of the photos, the virtual tours, and the floor plan, and as they hear of the special features of your home on the audio track, their hearts and minds are engaged, and they will begin to see the value in your home that you see. Then they will be more likely to pay the price you want for your home.

Virtual Tours Help Sell Homes

“Wow!” I regularly hear clients say that when I show them a virtual tour of one of my listings, yet I’m surprised that so few Realtors use them. They’re relatively cheap, easy to produce, provide tons of info to potential buyers, and wow potential sellers. And the bottom line – they help sell a house.
Through advanced computer software, I can take a series of photos and stitch them together to make a panorama of a home, up to 360°. I can link these panoramas together using hot spots to enable buyers to walk through a home on their computers any time of the day or night.

Normally I will make a panorama of the front of a home, and put a hot spot on the front door. That hot spot will be linked to another panorama taken just inside the front door, with hot spots on it linked to each of the doorways seen from there. Buyers can click on the hot spot to the living room and see a panorama. Then they can click the hot spot in the opposite corner, walk across the living room, and look back across to where they were. They can click on the hotspot that leads through the door to the dining room, or they can go back through the front door back outside the home. In this manner, buyers can virtually walk through an entire house on their own computer, from the comfort of their own homes any time, day or night, from anywhere in the world!  (See here for an example: http://www.visualtour.com/applets/flashviewer2/viewer.asp?t=1965973&sk=30)

I have taken virtual tours of neighborhoods so that prospective buyers can “walk through” the neighborhood to see if it suits their tastes. With large acreages, I will make virtual tours from each of the property corners or other property landmarks so potential buyers can “walk the property.” I can even take vertical tours of features like stone mantles, vaulted ceilings, or redwood trees in the yard.  (See here for an example:  http://www.visualtour.com/applets/flashviewer2/viewer.asp?t=1423875&sk=30&dm=290barley.com)

The primary benefit of virtual tours is that potential buyers get a very clear view of the look and layout of a home any time and from anywhere they want. Secondarily, I have the ability to “show” a home without my sellers having to spend hours cleaning it and getting it ready to show. The actual showings we receive are from people that have already walked through a home virtually, have liked what they have seen, and are ready to see if it looks as good in person as it does on the computer. I’ve actually spoken to one client who found his home through web searches, and didn’t look at any listings that didn’t have virtual tours. So when you decide to list your home, make sure you demand virtual tours from your agent. Your buyers will love you for it.