Many have felt intimidated to use Sketchup or Google Earth to showcase, because it seemed to hard to try. I am going to show you several ways you can utilize both right away.
- It can be as simple as putting a "For Sale" sign on location of the lot or home with a link to your website or blog where there are pictures of a virtual tour.
- You can put a floor plan or lot layout of a house or a whole development on location.
- You can put an entire house in color on location. It could be a house you draw yourself in Sketchup, Chief Architect, AutoCad, Cadsoft Envisioneer or whatever. You simply need to export it, (or have it exported by your designer or architect) in a format that you can import into Sketchup. My first choice is 3DS because it will bring in all the textures and colors you have assigned ahead of time. Other formats are DWG or DXF, PSD, JPG, BMP, etc. See the Sketchup info here: What kind of files can I import into Sketchup?
For the step by step tutorial go here: Placing a Sketchup Model in Google Earth
What will it look like? The following are photos directly from Google Earth of a model I just placed today. If you want to download the model yourself in Google Earth click on the following links and save them to your computer first. (If you don't save them to your computer they will not show up in Google Earth.) After they are saved, simply click on the link and it will open in Google Earth. House at 415 Fall Creek, Richardson, TX. (10 MB) Proposed Removable Deck Structure for the same property (3.75 MB)
What if you only want to put up a lot overlay with For Sale or Sold Signs? The process is basically the same you just upload from Sketchup the photo or 3D sign you want on your lot.
See the Hawk Ridge Development Plot in Google Earth: Click here
To view a sample 3D sign on a property in Google Earth Click Here Sample picture below.
The beauty of integrating with Google Earth is manifold.
- You can showcase all your properties as a virtual tour that you can upload to the same link. That way it will always be your current listings.
- You can showcase neighborhoods and location of schools, shopping, or other attractions to make it a positive experiencs.
- You get to create a link directly to your blog, website, or virtual tour at the same time.
- They are likely to share the link with their friends, family etc.
- And of course, it makes you look very progressive!
If you have any questions about integrating these features, please feel free to contact us. We will continue to try and give you ideas that are innovative and useful.
Ed Staelens
Regards, President Virtual Architec LLC
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