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Virtual Showings and Virtual Tours

EBSCO articles ( E ) are available only to NAR members and require the member's nar.realtor login.

As REALTORS® pivot to technology and virtual methods to show homes and properties, NAR compiled these handy links and resources to get you started.

Virtual Showings

Mabél Guzmán: A Strategy for Virtual Showings During COVID-19 ( National Association of REALTORS® )

Viewing Properties Virtually During COVID-19 [PDF]  ( National Association of REALTORS® )

Here’s What Every Seller Needs to Know About Virtual Showings ( DPIWow.com , Dec. 23, 2020)

Virtual Showings, The New Normal ( Consolto , Dec. 12, 2020)

The Evolution of Showing Homes During COVID-19 ( Rocket Mortgage , Aug. 21, 2020)

9 Ways for Sellers to Prepare a Virtual Showing ( Florida REALTORS® )

Virtual Tours

Remote Video Tours, ‘Sight Unseen’ Offers Become the Norm ( REALTOR® Magazine , Jan. 27, 2021)

5 Great Reasons Why You Should Use Virtual Tours of Homes for Sale ( Nextheme , Jan. 26, 2021)

Digitizing the American Dream ( Seattle Magazine , Dec. 22, 2020)

Virtual Real Estate Tours Give a Three-Dimensional Look at Properties ( NewsNBlogs , Dec. 17, 2020)

A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Virtual Home Tour ( REALTOR® Magazine , Nov.-Dec. 2020)

3D Home Tours Are All the Rage in Real Estate ( The Street , Nov. 16, 2020)

How Technology Has Changed the Selling Process in the Times of COVID ( RISMedia , Nov. 15, 2020)

Best Practices for Virtual Tours and Virtual Showings

How to Navigate a Virtual Tour for Real Estate ( Quicken Loans , March 3, 2021)

Avoid Liability in 'Sight Unseen' Sales ( REALTOR® Magazine , Jan.-Feb. 2021)

What You Need to Know About Using Virtual House Tours to Sell Your Home ( Yahoo! , Feb. 1, 2021)

10 Questions to Ask During a Virtual Home Tour ( AZ Big Media , Feb. 1, 2021)

Purchasing a Home Virtually? Here are 5 Tips! ( HousingWire , Jan. 21, 2021)

Here’s What Every Seller Needs to Know About Virtual Showings ( Connie Fitzgerald , Jan. 20, 2021)

Avoid These 5 Mistakes When Buying a Home Sight Unseen ( realtor.com® , Jan. 4, 2021)

Can Virtual Showings Help Keep Agents Safe? ( HomeRover , Dec. 17, 2020)

When to Invest in 3D Virtual Tours v.s. Video Tours in Real Estate in 2021 ( Cole Connor , Dec. 16, 2020)

How to Make a Virtual 360 Tour for Real Estate ( RE Photo Journal , Dec. 8, 2020)

Equipment and Online Platforms to Help with Virtual Showings ( Doreen Silver , Dec. 8, 2020)

How to Tour a House Today: Tips to Make the Most of Virtual or In-Person Showings ( realtor.com® , Nov. 11, 2020)

5 Secrets Buyers and Sellers Must Know About Virtual Home Tours ( Anthony Team Realty , Nov. 3, 2020)

Virtual Tours are Here to Stay. This is How to Do Them Right ( The New York Times , Sept. 1, 2020)

The Top 5 Tips to Prepare Your Listing for Virtual Showings ( McManamy McLeod Heller , Aug. 26, 2020)

Useful Websites

Asteroom  — Armed with just a phone and our affordable 3D tour kit, anyone can create a high-quality 3D virtual tour in minutes. No training or past experience required.  After you take the photos with our app, we will perform image enhancements as well as create a 3D dollhouse and 2D floorplan within 24 hours. We can even do 3D room staging if needed.

CloudPano  — CloudPano is the best software platform for publishing virtual tours. No coding required, keep your website domain, and even chat live with clients.

Facebook Live  — Live video on Facebook is immediate, authentic and interactive.

FaceTime  — Learn how to use FaceTime to make video and audio calls from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch.

Matterport  — Create experiences like nothing you’ve ever seen before. With a single scan, you can automatically create 3D walk-throughs, 4K print quality photos, schematic floor plans, OBJ files, point clouds, videos, and other media.

Messenger  — Hang out anywhere, anytime by getting on a call or a group video chat.

Skype Meet Now  — Generate your free unique link with one click, share it with participants and enjoy effortless meetings with Skype. Full set of features at your disposal.

TruPlace — For buyers looking to be guided through a property visually, TruPlace has Walkthrough Videos that escort viewers to each room. These video products are available at varying lengths from 1-minute to 4-minutes long, regardless of property size.

Zoom — Simplified video conferencing and messaging across any device.

eBooks & Other Resources

Facebook Marketing for Dummies (eBook)

How to Shoot Video That Doesn’t Suck (Kindle, eBook)

Master Facebook (Kindle, eBook)

Skype for Dummies (Kindle, eBook)

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Skype for PCs (eBook)

Tools for Live Streaming 8 (Kindle, eBook)

Video Marketing for Dummies (eBook)

Have an idea for a real estate topic? Send us your suggestions .

The inclusion of links on this page does not imply endorsement by the National Association of REALTORS®. NAR makes no representations about whether the content of any external sites which may be linked in this page complies with state or federal laws or regulations or with applicable NAR policies. These links are provided for your convenience only and you rely on them at your own risk.

Best Practices for Virtual Meetings

Best Practices for Working From Home

Virtual Tour vs Video Tour: Which is Better for Real Estate?

Virtual Tour vs Video Tour: Which is Best for Real Estate Marketing?

Virtual tours and video tours have become increasingly popular in the real estate industry as a way to showcase properties to potential buyers. But which one is better for real estate marketing? In this article, we'll explore the differences between virtual tours and video tours and help you decide which one is best for your business.

‍ Virtual Tours

‍ Virtual tours are interactive tours that allow potential buyers to explore a property in a 360-degree view. These tours provide a realistic and immersive experience, allowing viewers to see every corner of the property and get a better understanding of the layout and features. Virtual tours are typically created using specialized software and can be customized with branding, music, and narration.

‍ Video Tours

‍ Video tours are pre-recorded videos that showcase a property. These tours provide a guided tour of the property, highlighting its features and layout. Video tours can be created using a variety of equipment, from smartphones to professional cameras, and can be edited to include music, narration, and other effects.

Advantages and Disadvantages

Virtual tours and video tours are both popular methods used in various industries to showcase properties, travel destinations, museums, and more. While they share similarities in providing immersive experiences remotely, they also have distinct advantages and disadvantages. Let's explore them:

Advantages of Virtual Tours:

• Immersive experience: Virtual tours offer a highly immersive experience, allowing users to navigate and explore a space in a lifelike manner. They can move around, look in different directions, and get a sense of the space's layout and ambiance.
• Interactive exploration: Virtual tours often provide interactive elements such as hotspots, annotations, and multimedia content, enhancing the user's engagement. Users can click on specific points of interest, access additional information, or view related images and videos.
• Convenience and accessibility: Virtual tours can be accessed from anywhere at any time, eliminating the need for physical presence. Users can explore properties, tourist destinations, or museums remotely, making it convenient for people who are unable to visit in person due to distance, time constraints, or physical limitations.
• Cost-effective: Creating a virtual tour can be a cost-effective solution compared to organizing physical tours or exhibitions. It reduces expenses associated with travel, accommodation, setup, and maintenance of physical spaces.

Disadvantages of Virtual Tours:

• Lack of physical presence: Virtual tours cannot replicate the tangible aspects of a space, such as the sensation of touch, smell, or the overall atmosphere. This limitation can affect the overall experience, particularly for certain properties or destinations where these sensory elements are crucial.
• Technical requirements: Virtual tours may require specific hardware or software to be accessed and experienced properly. Users might need a stable internet connection and compatible devices, which could pose challenges for those with limited resources or technical expertise.
• Potential limitations in detail: Depending on the quality and resolution of the virtual tour, there may be limitations in capturing fine details of the space or object. This can impact the viewer's ability to examine intricate features or textures closely.

Advantages of Video Tours:

• Visual storytelling: Video tours can effectively convey the ambiance, atmosphere, and unique characteristics of a space through visual and auditory elements. They allow for storytelling techniques, showcasing the property or destination in a compelling and engaging manner.
• Dynamic presentation: Video tours can incorporate dynamic camera movements, transitions, music, voice-overs, and other effects to enhance the overall presentation. This can create an emotional connection with the audience and leave a lasting impression.
• Flexibility in editing: Video tours provide flexibility in terms of editing and post-production, allowing for the inclusion of various visual effects, annotations, and captions. This can help highlight key features, provide additional context, or customize the content for different audiences.

Disadvantages of Video Tours:

• Limited interactivity: Unlike virtual tours, video tours typically do not offer interactivity or the ability to explore the space in real-time. Viewers are limited to the perspective and content provided by the video creator, which may not align with everyone's interests or preferences.
• Lack of real-time information: Video tours are pre-recorded, meaning they may not reflect the most up-to-date information or changes in the property or destination. This can potentially lead to discrepancies between what is shown in the video and the current state of the space.
• Difficulty in capturing spatial perception: Videos may struggle to accurately represent the dimensions and proportions of a space. It can be challenging to convey the sense of scale or depth compared to experiencing a place in person or through a virtual tour.

Both virtual tours and video tours have their own strengths and weaknesses, and the choice between them depends on the specific goals, target audience, and resources available for implementation.

Virtual tours and video tours for real estate marketing depends on several factors. Virtual tours offer an immersive and interactive experience, allowing viewers to explore the property in a lifelike manner. They provide convenience and accessibility, reducing the need for physical presence and offering cost-effectiveness. However, virtual tours may lack the tangible aspects of a space and require specific technical requirements.

On the other hand, video tours excel in visual storytelling and dynamic presentation. They can create an emotional connection with the audience and offer flexibility in editing to customize the content. However, video tours lack interactivity, may not reflect real-time information, and struggle to accurately convey spatial perception.

Ultimately, the choice between virtual tours and video tours depends on the specific goals and preferences of the real estate marketer, as well as the target audience. It may be beneficial to consider a combination of both methods to leverage their respective strengths and provide a comprehensive and engaging marketing experience.

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How To Show Your Home During the Pandemic: The Definitive Seller’s Guide to Virtual Tours and More

For home sellers in the era of the novel coronavirus , showing off your home to potential buyers may seem like an impossible task. As people practice social distancing to help stop the spread of COVID-19, most open houses are on hold, and in-person home showings are limited across the country.

But there are still ways to  reach potential buyers and show your home in the best light—through virtual tours.

In the third part of our series, “ Home Selling in the Age of the Coronavirus ,” we highlight all the ways home sellers can give buyers an in-depth look at their property without actually opening their doors and risking the buyers’ health (or their own).

How virtual tours work

Virtual tours offer home buyers a remote, video-enabled walk-through of a property that will give them the sensation that they’re actually there—or at least darn close.

Real estate agents used virtual tours before COVID-19 as a unique marketing tool. Now, online tours are more important than ever, since they’re often the only easy way for buyers to check out a home without physically entering the property.

Virtual tours are recommended by the National Association of Realtors® as a way to avoid face-to-face contact while marketing homes during the coronavirus crisis.

“With the current shutdown, more and more home sellers are requesting that we offer buyers a virtual tour to help expedite the sale,” says Peggy Zabakolas , a real estate broker at Nest Seekers International in Bridgehampton, NY.

Real estate listing sites like realtor.com are featuring virtual tours on more and more listings. (Look for the virtual tour icon  on the bottom of the listing page.)

Types of virtual tours

Virtual tours can be conducted in a variety of different ways, depending on time, technology, and budget.

Probably the least complicated is where sellers or real estate agents use their smartphone camera to record a video as they walk through the home, showing off each room.

A more interactive option is to livestream a one-on-one showing with the buyers. This will give them more control over where you are pointing the camera, via FaceTime or another video streaming app (“Could you take a peek inside that closet/outside that window?”).

Yet another option home sellers might consider is a virtual open house.

With gatherings of more than 10 people prohibited across most of the United States, real estate agents have been forced to cancel open houses. But many are using tools like FaceTime or Zoom to host live virtual open houses so they can show potential buyers around a home.

Buyers often enjoy seeing the “raw footage” that a virtual open house or showing can offer, as opposed to a professionally produced video, says Angela Hornburg , team leader at the Hornburg Real Estate Group in Dallas.

Buyers can also ask questions, which may help them to feel more secure that they can be fully informed about the property—or perhaps even allow them to make an offer on the spot.

A more high-tech option for showing a home is setting up a fully fledged 3D tour. This is where a home seller, real estate agent, or a professional photographer uses a special 3D camera to capture images of the home.

These photos are uploaded into a proprietary software program that renders the visuals in three dimensions, creating a tour that can be uploaded onto a real estate listing.

Adding a 3D tour is a little more involved than taking a video on your phone, however—and it can also be pricey.

For example, the 3D visual platform Matterport offers packages ranging from $9.99 to $309 per month. Immoviewer’s prices range from $69 per month to $799 per year. Typically, a listing agent will pay for this as part of the marketing material.

While 3D tours are still rare, some people insist that they’re worth the cost, especially for higher-end properties. Homes can be viewed in several different ways, such as in dollhouse view, which shows how rooms are laid out in the house (see images below).

(Matterport/Realtor.com)

Virtual staging

Traditional staging—where furniture and artwork are arranged in a house to present the space in the best light—is a great selling tool, but it may be difficult to pull off at a time when sellers are reluctant to let outsiders into their house.

There’s a workaround here, too: virtual staging, which provides simulated images of a property laid out with alternative furnishings.

“Virtual staging, like physical home staging, is aimed at enticing home buyers and helping them connect emotionally with a property,” says Ilaria Barion , a luxury home stager , who offers both in-person and virtual staging.

Virtual home staging uses software to reimagine new decor in a property, in order to enhance the appearance of the space.

Unlike on-site staging, virtual staging comes with unlimited options, for example, paring down homes that are filled with furniture and ornament and displaying them with a simplified, cleaner design.

(Ilaria Barion Design)

(Ilaria Barion Design )

(Ilaria Barion Flow)

Just as with virtual tours, virtual staging was available before the coronavirus outbreak, but is especially important now. Even small, simple changes can make a big difference.

For instance: Does your property have an accent wall painted in a bright color that might turn off buyers? Virtual staging can wipe that away. Sellers should aim for “a neutral palette, so the new buyer can envision themselves living in it,” Zabakolas says.

Also, adding a few trendy accents can make a lasting impression on buyers.

“Small accents to dress up the home, such as flowers or centerpieces, help in any virtual or in-person tour,” says Tomer Fridman , a luxury and celebrity real estate expert at Compass in Los Angeles.

Staging a home virtually is cheaper than on-site staging, Barion says. Virtual staging costs a few hundred dollars and is usually paid for by agents, unlike traditional staging, which costs thousands. Virtual staging can also be completed in a matter of days.

“Virtual staging allows for many more options that would be cost-prohibitive in real life, like stripping down wallpaper, changing window treatment, adding a pool table, or replacing old furniture and fixtures,” Barion says.

How home sellers can use virtual tours to find the right buyer

Virtual tours and open houses can help buyers get to know a home, but the fact is that some may insist that they see a place in person before they feel confident about making an offer.

Although some areas, like the state of New York , are prohibiting in-person home showings at present, they are still happening in other places.

While it may be off-putting for sellers to allow buyers to enter their home, that may be necessary if they want to get an offer.

Virtual tours and showings nevertheless serve an important purpose: They help buyers get to know a property well enough to become serious contenders for a purchase.

In turn, virtual tours help sellers lower their risk of exposure to the coronavirus, by helping them whittle down the number of buyers who enter their house.

So how else can home sellers know a buyer is serious?  Maggie Wells ,  real estate agent  at Keller Williams Realty Greater Lexington in Kentucky, requires that buyers have a mortgage pre-approval and have taken a look at the virtual tour beforehand.

Agents also make sure to keep hand sanitizer, disinfectant wipes, and shoe coverings available for buyers to use during their in-person tour.

Selling a home during the coronavirus crisis presents many unique challenges. Being adaptable will help sellers to reach buyers and to make sure that the home is sold.

Erica Sweeney is a writer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Parade, HuffPost, Business Insider, Money, and other publications.

Twitter Follow @ericapsweeney

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Real estate video tours & 7 reasons why they work

As a real estate agent, you need to make yourself valuable so that you're among the top-earning real estate agents in the field. using real estate video tours lets you serve your audience and streamline the process of selling homes., real estate video tours give you a competitive edge.

To really get the most out of your agency, incorporating real estate video tours is a must.

Think about it -- plenty of real estate professionals serve your market, so it's only right that you develop strategies that others aren't using.

A client will be more likely to patronize your business when you go the extra mile and provide bells and whistles that other agencies are neglecting. Creating this multimedia content makes your pages more eye-catching and interesting than the competition as well.

In the same way that Google Business views sets companies apart from others in their field, a video tour establishes you as a cut above the rest.

In a congested real estate market, you need every age that you can get and video helps you capitalize on a huge base of users.

YouTube has more than 1 billion users , so posting your content here opens you up to a world that you otherwise would not have been exposed to.

Video Is Very Shareable

Carving out your space on the web is everything when it comes to business.

Since people are watching more video than ever on their computers and mobile devices, you always need to be tapped into this market. People share video like wildfire across the web, so real estate video tours can help get the word out.

Running a real estate agency lets you bring people in with relevant content so that they've already bought into your brand and expertise when it's time to purchase a house.

For example, posting a video about how to buy the right roof can intrigue someone today, and lead them to watch your virtual tours once they're ready to house hunt.

You can easily embed video links and share them amongst different platforms so that you're building an audience that you can sell homes to later.

People Can Picture Themselves Living In The Property

Above all, real estate video tours create a personal relationship with the buyer.

A person watching the video will view it vicariously, imagining how it would be to walk through those doors every day as a homeowner.

If you can make someone envision living at a property you're selling, you're well on your way toward making a sale.

This is traditionally accomplished through a home viewing . However, home viewings can only be shown to a finite amount of people, based on scheduling parameters.

With real estate video tours, you're essentially giving someone a viewing around the clock, as many times they would like to view it. It takes the pressure out of the situation and lets people take their time when getting a feel for a property.

The Video Answers Some Questions Ahead Of Time

Another great benefit of video tours is that it lets you get all of the information out on the front end.

The tour video can include four plans, prices, a list of utilities included, contact information and more.

By giving viewers all of this information out front, people can jump into more specific conversations leading toward the sale. It cuts out the amount of correspondence you have on the front end and weeds out buyers that are still dipping their toe into the water.

Make your real estate tour videos as informative as possible so that you're streamlining the process of selling homes to your community.

Your Listings Will Drive More Traffic

The more video tours you put out, the more traffic you'll get to your website and your brand as a whole.

People are more likely to watch a quick video than they are to comb through countless text-based listings. Once you condition people to view your video tours, they'll make you the go-to stop when they're ready to look at some houses for sale.

It's Easily Integrated With Social Media

Perhaps the best part of video tours is that they're easily incorporated into social media.

Since 3 billion people are projected to be on social media by the year 2020, creating social media friendly content is an investment. Today, social media is often the first place people check when seeking referrals from their network.

Creating content that people can easily post to social media keeps you in that conversation when these referral conversations happen.

To capitalize on social media buzz, be sure you're keeping your videos tight and high resolution. You want to stay within people's attention span while painting the home in the most favorable light.

Invest in some great video equipment, or better yet, hire a professional design company that can create rich video tour content for you.

Video Sells The Property Better Than Static Photos

When viewers have the choice of still photos vs. rich, HD video, video will win out every time.

A still photo doesn't necessarily represent a home you're trying to sell. Moving video helps people get a true assessment of room size, flow and design principles of the home.

Since you can only create a first impression once, top-notch video helps you to do every home listing justice.

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Are Virtual Tours Still Worth It in Real Estate? Evidence from 75,000 Home Sales

Virtual tours helped propel homebuying through the height of COVID-19. But now that life is back to normal, new research finds these 3D tours don’t significantly boost sale prices and may even prolong a property’s time on the market.

When factoring in the quality of photos and listing descriptions, virtual tours benefit sellers less than previous studies indicate, suggests research by Isamar Troncoso, an assistant professor of business administration at Harvard Business School. She studied more than 75,000 home sales to evaluate the impact of virtual tours.

“Maybe it doesn't help you to get a 5 percent sales price rise by using visual tools—but it might help sellers in many other ways.”

“Maybe in a time where you couldn't really go and see how it was in person, it seemed like having the virtual tours helped shorten time on market,” Troncoso says. “That appears to have been a short-term benefit. And once those restrictions are lifted, we come back to this world, where having this virtual tour doesn't really make a big difference in terms of sales outcomes.”

Still, some benefits of virtual tours persist for sellers and buyers alike, and knowing when to use these tools and when to forgo them is a key insight of the study, which Troncoso conducted with Mengxia Zhang, an assistant professor at Western University’s Ivey Business School. Technology continues to roil all sectors of the business world, with few areas watched more closely than real estate, an economic bellwether that remains white-hot despite high interest rates.

“Maybe it doesn't help you to get a 5 percent sales price rise by using visual tools—but it might help sellers in many other ways,” Troncoso says.

Virtual reality for house hunting

To parse selling behavior, the researchers used machine learning to sort data from the real estate platform Redfin for 75,178 houses sold in the greater Los Angeles area from March 2019 to March 2021. The time period gives a snapshot of how the effect might linger beyond lockdowns.

They combed listings for text and photos using computer vision and natural language processing. They examined each home’s sale price, number of days on the market, and initial price.

Then, they screened for 3D virtual tours, which combine images and interactive features to simulate the experience of walking through a home room by room. Depending on quality and expertise, creating a virtual tour can cost as little as $300 or less, or many thousands for realtors willing to hire a professional to photograph a large home.

Roughly 22 percent of houses used virtual tours. To break down those listings further, the authors looked at 20 standard house attributes in each, such as square footage, and whether the home needed repairs.

Researchers included walkability and bikeability scores, average number of offers homes in the area receive, and other neighborhood data parsed from the US Census via data curator SafeGraph . They also considered factors such as the neighborhood’s proportion of Black and Hispanic residents, a metric they think could be important since listings in these neighborhoods tend to feature fewer photos with lower aesthetic quality and more often are handled by smaller firms.

Location, location, location

Sellers who use virtual tours often provide longer descriptions and more high-quality photos, the authors discovered. After controlling for better photos and captions, researchers found virtual tours had an “insignificant” impact on final prices. That’s in contrast to a roughly 1.1 percent increase in sale prices from using virtual tours without those factors, or the 2 percent to 3 percent bump researchers found in earlier studies.

One possible reason for the tiny effect from virtual tours for most listings: pricing strategy of agents who use virtual tours. These sellers tend to start with a higher price, lowering it by the time a home is sold. That can mean listings linger on the market longer, the authors note.

“Maybe it doesn’t really get you to say, ‘Oh, now I really like that house,’ but it’s going to help you to be like, ‘Oh, I don’t like this one, so I won’t bother to go and see it.”

Location, though, provided another wrinkle. In areas served by smaller real estate firms and in less sought-after neighborhoods, virtual tools may help sellers. That’s because if a listing comes with a virtual tour, chances are the rest of the listing is higher-quality, too, Troncoso says.

“These are areas in which these technologies penetrated less,” Troncoso says. "So that's why you see a little bit more of a marginal effect when those sellers have virtual tours. Maybe they get more eyes on that listing.”

For buyers, there may be a bigger benefit that’s hard to nail down: Virtual tours can help screen out what a buyer doesn’t want, so they never make an offer. That may make a search more efficient in a tight housing market.

“Maybe it doesn’t really get you to say, ‘Oh, now I really like that house,’ but it’s going to help you to be like, ‘Oh, I don’t like this one, so I won’t bother to go and see it,’” Troncoso says.

Virtual tour tips

As virtual tour technologies improve—and become less expensive—smaller agents may be able to more efficiently oversee larger portfolios of homes and attract more possible buyers.

Future research areas may examine the use of virtual tours in long- and short-term rentals such as Airbnb. For now, the tours seem to be most used by buyers and sellers, and appear to be here to stay, Troncoso says.

So, when are virtual tours most—and least—useful? Troncoso offers this advice:

• If you’re working on a tight schedule, prioritize high-quality photos and descriptions for your listing, rather than virtual tours.
• When your house is in a Black and Hispanic neighborhood or one with lower average household income, consider including a virtual tour as part of your listing. That’s because virtual tours could mitigate greater uncertainty about property values in these neighborhoods, according to the paper.
• If you’re an agent or a virtual-tour creator, temper your clients’ expectations and highlight potential benefits, like their ability to reduce showings with unlikely buyers.

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