Would this be helpful to a realtor or not and why?

Question

I have a niche drafting business that specializes in creating floor plans of existing buildings. Would real estate professionals find it helpful to provide potential home buyers with a floor plan of a home they visited? This can be used as a hand-out after a visit and can have the realtors name and contact info on it, square foot or dimensions of rooms, or any other customization. Before you reply, think out of the box for a moment. Think how multiple home visits and the associated stress can become confusing a day or so after seeing 4 or 5 homes. Imagine a potential buyer being able to review a home you've taken them to and actually visualize themselves in the home (begin to plan themselves in it). "Which wall will we put the TV on?", "Which room will be the baby's room?", etc.

I ask because the realtor wife saw some drawings I provided her husband (a contractor) and said she would love to be able to give her customers something like this, but architects are too costly.

Would love some of your opinions...

I ask because the realtor wife saw some drawings I provided her husband (a contractor) and said she would love to be able to give her customers something like this, but architects are too costly.

Would love some of your opinions...

Ryan Murdock · Answer

I can have a residential Matterport 3D tour done for a couple hundred bucks.

A drawn floor plan would suit me better on commercial listings but my guess is big commercial brokerages have their own systems to generate those.

If anything you might get residential listing agents to buy it so it's one more thing they can tout to their prospective listing clients that they include with their listing package. Listing agents love fluff so you may have a market just based on that.

Andrew Johnson · Answer

@Paul Miller I'm not a realtor to OH I WISH I COULD HAVE THIS FOR EVERY SINGLE PROPERTY I VIEW ONLINE!  That said, I think it matters a lot more for a personal residence (that you'd live in) that it does for a rental property.  The challenge that I think you're going to have is that you would sit in the middle ground.  The "low end" is basically nothing but pictures with a nice camera (or iPhone these days) and posting the kitchen first, letting people scroll through, etc.  The "high end" is those walk-throughs that involve 3D systems, being able to drag your mouse to pan around the rooms, etc.  What I don't know is a.) how much your service costs and b.) how much the "high end" service costs.  If you're charging $500 and the high-end service is $800 it's probably going to be hard to make case to stop at $500.  If the nice "walk through" apps are $5,000 then it's a different story.  The other thing that I've noticed is that there are apps out there (they aren't free) that basically can measure rooms as you walk through them using the camera.  I don't know how easy/hard they are to use but it wouldn't surprise me if someone could stitch together a floorplan using that.  Anyway, just rambling now...

Paul Miller · Answer

Here is an example. You've all seen these when dealing with new home builders, but this would be created for an older home on the market.

3D virtual tours are great but this is intended to be a practical, usable tool. You all realize the more comfortable and familiar a potential buyer is with a home the more likely they will purchase it.

Alexa Jones · Answer

It's a good idea and it's really helpful for realtors. I wonder when I will add this practice to my estate agent training

Paul Miller · Answer

Thanks Ryan. Just as an FYI, the majority of my work is for commercial buildings because unless a building was built within the last 10 years or so, they actually do not have them or even have systems in place for generating them. (There are reasons not important for this discussion why building owners often need editable floor plans).

Between my experience buying a home and some feedback I received from selling my home, I wondered if this would be valuable to other agents. Thanks for your opinion.

Jacob Wathen · Answer

It definitely depends on the cost. I believe it would be nice to present that with the packet of things that I do for my sellers but it would have to make sense with the property. In my market there is a photographer that offers that service for 25 extra bucks. Unfortunately they only have their marketing information on the handouts.

Paul Miller · Answer

Thanks Andrew. I actually recently sold a home and purchased another and used the virtual tours offered on most RE websites. They are helpful and almost standard practice today, however, from my experience one of the frustrations in our decision process was not being clear on space allotments after seeing so many homes.  Will the living room fit our couch?, etc. I provided one for my prospective buyers because it's what I do and I received a few "hey, good idea" comments. Remember, they walk away with a physical diagram which they can refer back to, sketch on, and compare with others. It's a usable tool rather than just a pretty visualization.

My price point for a typical home would be about $175 - $225. Those software programs you mentioned are cool, but involve time and effort. My service doesn't require time or effort on the realtors part, which makes it easy for them. Thanks for your opinion.

Would this be helpful to a realtor or not and why?

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