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5 Ways To Deal With Difficult Home Owners As A Real Estate Photographer

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5 Ways To Deal With Difficult Home Owners As A Real Estate Photographer

As professional real estate photographers, we may encounter homeowners who present unique challenges, making your job more difficult and demanding.

Dealing with difficult homeowners can be a delicate task that requires clear communication, patience, and professionalism.

In this article, we’ll explore 5 effective strategies and techniques to navigate such situations, ensuring a smoother and more productive experience for all the parties involved.

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It's All About Communication

Whether you are the one to communicate expectations and directions to the homeowner, or someone else does, communication is going to be key in making your job easier.

Regardless of which of the following tactics you choose to use in order to deal with a difficult homeowner, it’s going to be very important that you communicate openly and respectfully.

You have a job to do, but you are in their home and they are most likely feeling a bit stressed about the whole process. This is a great thing to keep in mind when you start to get a little annoyed that they keep standing in front of your camera.

1. Openly Communicate Your Needs And Expectations

The best way to go about dealing with a difficult homeowner is to openly communicate your needs and expectations to them. This can be done in a number of ways.

Here are some phrases that I use when I’m trying to communicate as best I can:

“I‘m going to be photographing the entire first floor, so it’s important that nobody is in the photo. Do you think you could go upstairs and hangout while I finish the 1st floor?”

“This photo is going to show all three of the rooms, so I’m going to need all of these rooms to be open. Would you mind standing in one of the other rooms while I complete this set of photos?”

In my experience, this open communication works about 90% of the time. Most homeowners have no idea what to do while on a shoot and would love to be directed to make things go smoother.

However, this article is about difficult homeowners and this is not really a difficult situation. Which leads us to our next tactic.

2. Work With The Realtor

If a homeowner is being particularly difficult and they continue to stand in your shot, not listen to your directions, or just sort of be clueless all together, it can be a good idea to get the realtor involved.

Now, this is assuming that the realtor is on site with you and willing to help. If they are, you can pull them aside and let them know that you would love for them to distract the homeowner or simply help echo your needs and directions to them.

I listed this in our article Common Qualities Of The Best Realtors To Work With As A Real Estate Photographer. Having a realtor that understands the difficulties of shoots and is willing to help is a great thing.

They can provide the support you need to help your job go smoothly. Even if they just chat with the homeowner in another room, it can be extremely helpful.

3. Provide The Homeowner A Checklist

This idea sort of works under the same principle of open communication, but this time you have the directions written down so the homeowner has a reference sheet.

If you choose to go this route, it’s best to give them the checklist right away and probably to make sure that it’s ok with your client.

Make sure the checklist outlines what you’ll be doing so the homeowner understands that you have a job to do and you don’t need their help. We have a checklist that can help in this situation which you can see in our article Free Real Estate Photography Checklist.

Hand it to the homeowner, let them know that this is what you’ll be doing while you are in their home, and inform them that you’ll need them to not be in the rooms while you’re taking photos.

4. Professionally List Your Credentials and Showcase Your Work

As professionally and politely as you can, explain to the homeowner that you are a professional real estate photographer, you have photographed hundreds of homes, and that you do not need help.

You can do this by talking about some of the best homes you’ve photographed and then showing them photos from your portfolio. The hope here is that you ease any tensions or anxiety that the homeowner has about how the photos might look.

Although this might seem time consuming and annoying, it’s going to be far more time consuming and annoying dealing with a homeowner that simply will not let you do your job.

Present yourself as the professional on a job and give them hard expectations. Something like this phrasing can work:

“I’ve worked as a professional real estate photographer for the past 6 years and have photographed hundreds of homes. If you want to see some of my work, here is a link to my portfolio which you can check out on your phone. I’m going to need you to wait in the other room while I photograph this room, otherwise the photo is not going to look as good as possible.”

5. Prior To The Shoot, Ask That The Homeowner Not Be Present

This is a way to simply eliminate the possibility of a homeowner being difficult.

It’s quite common for homeowners to go out for a coffee or talk a walk in a park while their home is being photographed. This is a policy that you can bring up with your clients prior to any shoots.

This is especially a good idea if you or your client knows or has a good idea that this homeowner is going to be especially difficult.

Although it might sounds odd to kick someone out of their own house so you can do your job, it’s really the best case scenario for all parties involved.

Without the homeowner present, you will be able to photograph the home better and more quickly than if you were dealing with a homeowner that wants to be involved or won’t stop asking questions.

Additional Resources

If you’re just getting started in real estate photography, check out our Beginners Guide. It’s full of helpful articles and tips that will guide you in the right direction as you begin your real estate photography journey.

You can check out our Gear section as well to see reviews and recommendations on the latest real estate photography gear.

If you’re more interested in other resources that can help your real estate photography business, check out our Business Resources page.

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About author
Matthew Digati is a professional Real Estate and Architectural Photographer. Matthew has worked as a Real Estate and Architectural Photographer since 2015 and has photographed properties and projects all over the United States.
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