Real Estate Photos

In mid-June, we invited two real estate agents to look at our house and discuss options for making our house stand out in the market. Several outdoor items were very clear: trim the bushes, bury the antenna wires, clean up behind the shed, pressure wash the house. One of the big labor-intensive choices was whether or not to paint the interior of the house. It was clear to me that we really didn't have a choice - the interior was in dire need of a fresh coat of paint.

For several weeks in July, Susan and I worked on the paint project. It didn't start out as smoothly as we had hoped. We bought three gallons of an off-white paint and painted the guest closet. The next morning, we were shocked at how bright white the paint turned out. We decided we needed to rethink our color choice. Back at the hardware store, we were told that they couldn't accept our two gallons of paint for return, since it was already mixed. Oh well. We bought one gallon of our new, softer choice and tried it out. This was a winner, so we bought several more gallons and got busy painting.

We started the painting in the guest bedroom and short hallway, then moved into the dining room. The dining room was a serious challenge because we first had to kill the existing green paint. We ended up putting on two coats of Killz, then two coats of paint. Next was Andrew's room, then the wide open space of the living room, and finally the kitchen and master bedroom. We touched up in the two bathrooms and called them good.

I must admit that we didn't do it all alone. We had some help from some friends. At one point, one of the agents and her husband stopped by to help paint. At another, Susan's friend from church took Andrew for about six hours so we could paint without interruption.

When we were finally finished painting what needed painting, the agents came back to take some photos for the sales page on the Internet and the flyer. I had a bad feeling about the quality and care of the shots, and my fears were realized when the agent pulled out a tiny point-and-shoot digital camera and started snapping shots willy-nilly. A week later, the shots were posted on the web site. Susan and I were taken aback by some of the photo choices. We decided that we needed to be proactive and take our own photos.

On August 24, we went to Costco and bought a Canon Rebel XSi digital SLR. I played with it for a few days, then started taking new pictures for the web page. Below is a collection of the photos I took.

Front yard

Back patio

Main living area

Kitchen

Dining room

Main living area, kitchen nook

Master bedroom

Master bathroom

Bedroom

Bathroom