Through Redfin’s Partner Referral Program, we see a lot of great reviews come in for our partner agents, many of which cause us to consider new ways to best serve real estate clients. We partner with agents who share our values and refer clients to them in each of our markets. We had a review come in last week for Sharlene Rundio, a partner agent in Phoenix, Arizona who really wowed her client by using video, "Shar went above and beyond the call of duty, sent excellent video footage of the properties I needed to "see" from afar, and truly understood what I was looking for. She worked tirelessly through a very difficult sale, dealing with a very difficult bank and keeping me informed at every step. I can't thank her enough."
Of course the use of video in real estate is nothing new, but in our experience, it has been used primarily by listing agents to market their properties. Here Sharlene Rundio is using video to actually tour properties for her clients, allowing clients to get a good idea of what a property looks like without having to even step foot into the home. This is particularly great for out-of-town clients. She posts her videos onto her YouTube channel which means others may also be able to benefit from her videos. Through the use of smartphones, nearly all of us are already carrying video cameras around with us, and some of them are even pretty decent. Tech Savvy Agent wrote a blog post back in October 2010 featuring lenses you can buy for an iTouch 4, including a snazzy wide angle lens that can just be snapped onto your iTouch 4 or iPhone 4 for much less than a hiring a professional videographer. HD Flip video cameras have become quite popular and make it simple to both shoot video and upload to your computer. Kodak also makes a small HD video camera, and both the Flip video and Kodak cameras accommodate affordable wide angle lenses.
More recently, ActiveRain and Kodak sponsored a video challenge, putting out a call for creative use of video in real estate, and the winners were announced last week. The videos ranged from virtual tours of homes, to neighborhood and town tours to a video about the disappearing “Realtorsarus” and the dawning of transparency in real estate.
In what other ways are agents using videos? What other options are out there for using video to best serve our clients?
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