If you’re in real estate and have ever wondered about virtual staging and how to get it done, then you’ve come to the right place.

The Art of Real Estate Photography

The real estate photography industry can be one of the most rewarding to work in. There is no better feeling than knowing that your realtor client was able to sell a home because the top-quality real estate photos you provided them helped bring the future buyer through the doors.

But, the real estate photography industry is becoming more and more competitive. That’s why real estate photographers are always on the lookout for the next best and newest thing to add to their list of services. So what’s the next best thing in real estate photography? The answer might surprise you…

Virtual staging is quickly taking the real estate photography industry by storm. With virtual staging, you can bring life to photos of vacant listings while saving valuable amounts of time, money, and effort. For those who don’t know, virtual staging is a special computer-assisted design (CAD) process wherein virtually designed furniture is added to a photo of an empty room, much like traditional home staging. Virtual staging has taken the real estate marketing scene by storm recently. With new faster, better, and more realistic tools and techniques, virtual staging continues to become more and more popular in real estate marketing!

Virtual Staging: One of The Most Valuable Real Estate Marketing Tools

Homebuyers want to be able to feel what it would be like to live in a property. They don’t want to see an empty room with white walls and a bare floor. They want to experience a room with soul; furniture, pictures on the wall, plants on the counters, and books on the shelves…the kinds of things that give a space warmth and life.

That’s why realtors began using home staging as a tool to sell homes in the first place. In the words of HomeValueLeads

“Instead of selling shells and relying on buyers to use their imaginations, real estate agents outfitted homes for sale with an image of what the home might look like,”

And it really worked! Suddenly every agent needed to put in the time and money for organizing furniture and props for their showings.

Home staging was so successful that specialty home staging companies sprang up all over the place to fulfill the increase in demand. The more sophisticated the staging became, the more expensive it became as well. According to realtor.com,

“The average cost for a home staging consultation is $300 to $600. The average cost to stage a room per month is $500 to $600.”

That’s the cost per month! If the home doesn’t sell quickly, the cost for home staging can really start to add up!

The other thing which has made home staging less of a must-have is the rise of the internet. Now, prospective buyers spend a lot more time doing their research online, rather than visiting properties in person. People are either buying places that are too far away to visit in person, or they are too busy to see the listing for themselves. So they rely almost exclusively on the images that they see online through listing sites like Zillow and Trulia.

This is what has made virtual staging so successful in today’s digital age. Now, realtors can dress a room exactly the way they want it, cater to a specific market or niche of people and present realistic virtual staging photos of the property immediately to interested buyers.

Understanding The Process of Virtual Staging


The great news about virtual staging is that you don’t need to be a wiz on Photoshop or an interior designer in order to get great results. All you need to do is sign up for a virtual staging service like PhotoUp to start working with a team of 3D furniture modelers and staging specialists. All you need to do is send over your images and pick a furniture set from their online virtual staging catalog, and they’ll take care of the rest! Quickly turn an empty photo of a room into an attractive, sellable, and cost-effective marketing tool.

PhotoUp’s Virtual Staging Catalog is divided into two sections: Sets & Furniture:

Virtual Staging Sets include:

Virtual Staging Furniture includes:

Once you make your virtual furniture selections, the designers and editors take over using CAD software to place the furniture into the room, adjust the lighting, edit the photo and finish it off so that the prospective buyer will not even be able to tell the difference between a real room and a virtual staging image.

How Much Does Virtual Staging Cost?


Virtual Staging can vary in cost from $10 all the way to $100+ per room. Whichever virtual staging company you choose, virtual staging is still likely more cost-effective than real home staging.

PhotoUp’s virtual staging services start at 25 credits ($25) per image, which includes 7 pieces of furniture, standard photo editing, and a 1-to-2-day turnaround.

There are so many benefits to virtual staging that it’s no surprise that this is one of the biggest growth areas in real estate marketing today. Not only is it way more affordable than home staging, but research shows how much easier and quicker it is and how buyers are willing to pay more for a staged home than an empty one.

So, if you’re ready to include the power of technology in your real estate photography business, then create an account with PhotoUp and start providing even more value for your real estate clients.