When Does 'Touching Up' a Listing Photo Become Fraud?

I think most advertising would be fraud if editing weren't allowed.  Look at how they photograph food.  A lot of times it's fake.

I think most advertising would be fraud if editing weren't allowed.  Look at how they photograph food.  A lot of times it's fake.

Why - big WHY - did all 3 photos get included in the listing? Are there no other spots to show? The charge of fraud is very heavy, as far as I'm concerned.

Jane Pacheco

Roger, great points.

Blurring a window pane tells me, and the buyer, that the "view" is not a view at all. This gives the buyer a bad taste in their mouth, as they immediately assume that the seller is trying to conceal/hide a negative about the property.

I have never met a home-buyer who wasn't interested in what can be seen from a property's windows.

So, what is outside of this blurred window? Brick wall? Dumpster? Junkies shooting up?

Since buyers make phonecalls to view properties based largely on photos, this is a crazy move. And deceitful.

Security is also an intrinsic need that buyers seek to have fulfilled, so if the bars on the window are blurred, yet visible when they view the property, now they wonder what else the seller is hiding.

I doubt that the use of a wide-angle lens could be considered fraud.  Shooting wide angle merely takes in a wider field of view.  There is often some distortion that goes along with that, but such distortion can be as much a negative as it is a positive.

Just read article 12 of the code of ethics.  A picture is a part of your advertising and should not be misleading.

Hello Roger:

You appear to be on the something here and I have suggested.

Its hard to imagine all photos taken with a wide angle lens are to be considered an act of fraud. It just doesn't make sense.

In the specific case of the three photos included in a listing showing different amounts of detail though the windows, since all three are offered, I don't see any misrepresentation. Nothing is being hidden. If the only the photo with the white out windows was offered maybe a different case, but still a real stretch to call it fraud.

I am interested in hearing others comments and if there is any case law on the subject.

Roger, our staff photographer will photoshop anything that does not change the character of the house.  He fixed a sofa arm that a sellers cat clawed in a living room picture, but he won't take scratches out of a wood floor.  He'll photoshop a child's scooter from the front sidewalk, but won't fix peeling paint on the siding.  My feeling is that anything that's going to raise a false expectation is a bad idea.

Roger, so sorry for the misleading phrase. I was referring to very heavy in sarcasm. To charge it as fraud is just too heavy for a simple edit, which did not alter the interior of the house. Again, sorry, I meant the other way around.

Jane Pacheco

I don't see how blurring a window pane is different from, say, closing the drapes or the shutters...after all, both obscure the view. At the end of the day, the buyer is going to ultimately figure out whether or not they can live with the view as it is.

Some people don't have enough to do;  the author of the curb article appears to have an ax to grind. He needs to keep looking for something more substantial.

Roger ~ I have wondered this myself from time to time. Just yesterday I was shooting in a neighborhood and wished I had noticed a basketball goal blocking the view I wanted to shoot. I didn't know whether to somehow photoshop out the basketball goal or not. It's not staying with the property and didn't seem misleading...but I still didn't feel comfortable altering the photo. I can see where misleading alterations could get someone in hot water!