How to photograph a house exterior

To photograph a house exterior well, shoot when the sun is on the front of the house. Stand at a front corner so the photo shows depth, and hold the phone level at about chest height. Clear the driveway of cars and the curb of bins first. On a grey day, shoot anyway and keep the grey sky. That's the house buyers will see when they drive past.

The front photo is usually the first image in the listing and the thumbnail in search results. It gets more looks than any other shot.

Timing: which way does the house face?

The single biggest factor is where the sun is. Zillow's photography guide puts it simply: shoot when the sun is behind the camera and lighting the front of the house. Here's what that means in practice, for homes in the northern hemisphere.

• East-facing front: morning. The front is in shade by early afternoon.
• West-facing front: afternoon, into the last hour or two before sunset when the light warms up.
• South-facing front: sun most of the day. Avoid the middle hours, when the sun is high and throws hard black shadows under the eaves and porch roof. Mid-morning or mid-afternoon is better.
• North-facing front: the hard one. The front stays in shade most of the year. In summer, very early morning or the last hour of the evening can put low sun on it. Otherwise wait for a bright overcast day, which lights every side evenly.

Check the direction on a map app before you go. It saves a wasted trip.

What backlighting looks like

Shoot a house with the sun behind it and the front turns into a dark shape against a bright sky. You can pull some of it back in editing, but a return visit at the right hour always looks better.

Where to stand

Take at least two front shots.

1. The corner angle. Stand off one front corner, roughly 45 degrees to the house, so the photo shows the front and part of one side. Zillow's guide recommends an angled shot because it shows the depth and size of the house. Try both corners and keep the one with the better garage, tree or driveway line.
2. Straight on, from across the street or the far edge of the lawn. It's the most honest view of the facade and works well for symmetrical houses.

Then add what buyers want next: the back of the house from the far end of the yard, the patio or deck, the yard itself, and any view the house has.

Lens and height

From across the street, use the 1x lens and step back rather than switching to 0.5x. The ultra-wide makes the house look small and far away and fills the bottom of the frame with lawn and driveway. Save 0.5x for tight lots where you can't get back far enough.

Hold the phone at chest height and keep it level. The temptation with a two-story house is to tilt up to fit the roof in. That makes the walls lean inward, and buyers read it as a cheap photo. Step back instead, or accept a bit more lawn at the bottom and crop later. Fixing leaning vertical lines explains the geometry.

Clear the frame

Walk the front before you shoot. Most of these take a minute.

• Move every car out of the driveway and off the street in front of the house. Ask neighbors if their car is parked right in the shot.
• Take the trash and recycling bins out of sight.
• Coil the hose and put away the kids' bikes.
• Take down seasonal decorations.
• Close the garage door.
• Mow the day before and sweep the walk and driveway.
• Turn on the porch lights and a few interior lights. Lit windows make a house look lived-in, even in daylight.
• Check the lawn edge and planting beds. Fresh mulch shows up in photos.

What you shouldn't clear from the frame, in editing or otherwise, is anything permanent: power lines, a neighbor's house, a utility box, the highway behind the fence. California's AB 723 lists utility poles and neighboring properties by name as things you can't quietly edit, and the CRMLS rules ban removing wires and poles from listing photos.

Overcast days

A grey day isn't a lost day. Cloud cover spreads light evenly, so there are no hard shadows and the shaded side looks like the sunny side. For a north-facing house, it's often the best light you'll get.

The sky will be grey. Keep it grey. Buyers who drive by on a similar day will see what they expected. Adjust exposure so the house is bright, even if the sky goes a bit pale.

Fake blue skies, and why we don't make them

Sky replacement is the most common edit in listing photos. An analysis by the real estate tech company Coraly, reported by Realtor.com, looked at nearly 40,000 primary listing images. Almost 11% showed signs of digital alteration, and sky replacement made up 69% of those. More than 90% of the altered images carried no visible disclosure.

Plenty of people consider a sky swap harmless. Zillow's own guide for sellers suggests it. I don't agree, for two reasons.

The first is the rules. AB 723 defines a digitally altered image as one where software or AI was used to add, remove or change elements in the image. It excludes lighting, color, exposure and straightening only when those "do not change the representation of the real property." A new sky isn't on the exclusion list. CRMLS's advice for anything borderline is "when in doubt, err on the side of caution" and disclose. So if you swap the sky in California, label the photo and post the original beside it. Our MLS disclosure rules guide covers where labels go on different boards.

The second is the showing. A blue sky with fluffy clouds over a house that sits under grey cloud most of the winter sets up a small letdown at the curb. It's the first thing the buyer sees in person, and it tells them the photos were tweaked. They start wondering what else was.

That's why Real Estate Camera doesn't offer sky or twilight replacement. Enhance fixes exposure, white balance and verticals and recovers window detail. It keeps the sky exactly as you shot it and doesn't touch the architecture or the landscaping. If you want a blue sky, come back on a blue day. If you want a twilight shot, shoot one, about 15 minutes after sunset with every light on and the phone on a tripod.

A phone workflow for the exterior

1. Check which way the house faces and pick your hour.
2. Clear cars, bins and hoses. Turn on porch lights.
3. Shoot the corner angle from both sides, 1x, chest height, level.
4. Shoot straight on from across the street.
5. Shoot the back, the yard and the patio.
6. Take three or four frames of each. Wind moves trees and a car always drives through.
7. Run Enhance on the keepers, 1 credit each, 20 to 60 seconds a photo.

For the inside of the house, see shooting listing photos on an iPhone and the full shot list. If you're selling without an agent, FSBO listing photos covers the whole house. Landlords shooting a building should read rental listing photos. And if your interior shots came out dark, fixing dark real estate photos will help.