DONE BEATS PERFECT

One question I’ve wrestled with since becoming a broker is this: Should I take professional photos and videos for every listing? Or should I just take quick photos with my phone, post the property, and move on?

Early in my career, I thought the answer was obvious. Professional photos and videos. Better lighting. Better editing.

At one point, I spent 3 hours manually removing electric wires from a house photo because they were blocking the facade.

I thought better-looking ads would strengthen my brand, attract more serious buyers, and help me sell more properties. So I rationalized all kinds of purchases. Gimbals. Editing software. Drones. A powerful desktop for 4K video. A phone that could shoot 4K at 120 fps.

The logic was simple: Better content should mean better results. But real estate has a way of humbling you.

Sometimes, after spending hours shooting and editing, you find out the property was sold by another broker using nothing more than crooked, smudged phone photos.

Other times, the property itself is not ready for a polished shoot. The owner still lives there so it's cluttered. No amount of cinematic camera movement can hide the fact that the listing is not presentation-ready.

And for some brokers, creating beautiful cinematic videos creates another problem. Once people see that level of work, everyone starts expecting the same treatment for their own properties.

But the real questions are: Does every property deserve that level of effort? What if the property is overpriced?

Over time, my answer has changed: Speed to market matters more than perfection. The first job is to get the property in front of the market.

Post it. Test the price. See if there is interest.

If the listing gets traction, then you can come back and improve the materials. Take better photos. Shoot better videos. Clean up the copy. Create the cinematic version.

But don’t delay launching a property just because the content is not perfect yet. In real estate marketing, done is usually better than perfect.

The best system is two-step: First, get it out. Then, if the listing deserves it, make it better.