Bad MLS Photos
This is a new category that I have wanted to do for some time because of the horrible photos I come across in the MLS. If you have a really bad MLS photo that you would like to have featured in this post please email it to me along with a short description of the picture.
Can you believe this agent took a digital photo of a Polaroid and uploaded it into the MLS? Come on, are agents really this lazy??? They couldn’t drive out to the property and take a photo? Why are they collecting a commission? On top of everything, they only uploaded 1 photo in the MLS!!!
This is a nice photo of the kitchen. You would think they could clean the floor, close
the cabinets and take a photos that looks a little better with better lighting. As bad as this house was, you can always to a better job and take more then 2 pictures of the home to show in the MLS.
The photo on the bottom right is NOT a bad MLS photo. A friend emailed this to me. It’s a bank owned home and these are the first pictures taken since the previous occupant moved out. This is the condition the property was left in by the previous occupant! WOW!
As an added bonus you can include a short description of your services and website and I will link back to your site. Enjoy and please feel free to forward a link to your Bad MLS Pictures!
This photo on the left is great. Check out what is laying on top of the dryer! Man, that is a great spot to have a toilet. Could you imagine someone using the toilet, having a smoke next to the water heater while they wait for the laundry to dry. What service!
How about this photo above? Looks like a classic example of a copy and paste job. (Stealing another agent’s photos) Come on people, go out and take your own photos and learn how to upload large quality pictures!
Want to see more BAD MLS Photos? Check out this website Barry Beavis put together. It’s called “Bad MLS Photos” which has a large selection of Bad MLS Photos from Lazy Realtors. 
Alex Aguilar
Team Aguilar
Real Estate Agent, Blogger!
Alex@TeamAguilar.com
www.TeamAguilar.com
Real Estate Blog
May 5th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
That Polaroid photo is pretty bad! I can’t imagine a real estate agent taking a photo of a photo and using it in the MLS, that is pretty sad!
May 10th, 2008 at 11:53 pm
Sweet. I love looking at bad MLS photos. Matt Pellerin did a post a while back on an agents virtual tour. The house was absolutely disgusting… Pretty funny stuff.
May 13th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Oh snaps, that first picture was horrible. As the owner it’s immediately time to get worried. lol
Cool post.
May 14th, 2008 at 3:02 am
lol. How many client do you think he got from that picture?
But,what the heck. At least he got a picture of the house.
June 10th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
The MLS in Austin changed a while ago and many agents don’t seem to know how to upload good photos. There is a size limitation and many agents upload really small photos. If uploaded correctly, the photo whould enlarge when clicked on. I know that everyone isn’t a techhie, but this knowing how to display photos correctly is one of the musts for any listing agent.
June 18th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
Lousy pictures are a pet peeve of mine as well. There are professional photographers who will take the pictures for you if you can’t seem to take your own.
June 20th, 2008 at 6:46 am
I wont deal with this kind of agents, absolutely not. Those are the worst photo possible to show to clients. I wonder if he got clients…
June 30th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
Great idea for a topic! As someone who’s spent a lot of time searching for a home the last few months, I’m shocked at some of the HORRIBLE photos I find online. I don’t get it at all. What are some people thinking?!
June 30th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Funny! I can’t believe how often I have to explain to people that they really need to shoot some better photos of the property. It’s like they think “a photo is a photo” but it’s a lot more than that, a photo is what people are going to base their decision on whether to contact you or not. The house may be really great, but the prospective buyer has never seen it and experienced it’s charm; the photo is all they have to go on.
July 5th, 2008 at 7:33 am
You would think that the real estate agents who posted those photos, would be good at “selling” and should know that you can’t sell without a good photo :-p
July 17th, 2008 at 9:02 am
We love it when we do a listing presentation and can show some of these photos to the home owner and then compare the better photos that we use. Thanks for the great “bad” examples!
August 30th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
My wife and I searched for months online looking for our new home. We would definitely exclude listings based on photos, and some poor listings got us in the door to at least look at the place because of the quality and staging of their photos. Considering how visual a medium the internet is, I am surprised by how little care is taken by real estate agents to get really good pictures done of their inventory.
No, we don’t need another picture of the corner. No we don’t need another picture of an open door.
September 5th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Thanks for posting these incredibly bad photos. They remind me of a friend who wanted to take photos of a new listing from some angles that de-emphasized numerous poorly-conceived home additions. But NO! The client insisted that photos taken by her son be used.
September 5th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
The bad photos are one thing but what really bugs me the most is when a property is listed on the MLS with ZERO photos! I just came across a property yesterday in our local San Diego MLS that has been on the market for 28 days! I wish the bank knew what a horrible job their real estate agent was doing for them. I don’t care how ugly or bad a property looks just take some photos and post them in the MLS. Get in your car and spend a little gas money!!!
Carlos Aguilar
September 17th, 2008 at 3:23 am
Some parts can be removed using Photoshop
February 26th, 2009 at 2:26 am
wow this is really great ides and people can get backlink as well.and the images are funny as well…i am suprised with that the house under bridge image…its funny lol…
thanx for sharing such a great idea.keep it up.
October 15th, 2009 at 2:01 am
Unbelievable. I feel sorry for the websites which has such terrible photos in their MLS. This cleary shows the shabby work by them, but I dont think its a big deal from customers point of view. But still this is going to give them a bad reputation. I have been thinking of employing a prosumer photographer for taking pictures of homes for sale exclusively.
Mack@Las Vegas Real Estate´s last blog ..Commercial Real Estate Bubble
March 24th, 2010 at 8:16 am
I had a client who e-mailed me once because the pictures of a home (not my listing) that I sent to him were terrible. I actually knew the house and knew the pictures were not doing it justice. He told me when he looks at a listing I send him the 1st thing he looks at is the size sq. footage and number of rooms than he looks for the photo’s if there are none he stops there because he figures the house is so bad they do not want to share the photo’s. If it has bad photo’s he looks at the listing agent (listed at the very bottom of the listing in small print) and remembers to thank himself that that was not the agent he chose to market his home. Then depending on the rest of the homes criteria he might just disregard the listings because he could not get a clear picture of it.
He is looking quite a few miles from his home so drivebys are not really practical unless everthing looks right on paper or on the net.
Moral: Pictures are very important!
Gwen@Jefferson County Missouri Real Estate
April 2nd, 2010 at 3:10 pm
I’ve always wanted to question agents who use photos such as these, or who think that a picture of a toilet with the seat up is going to attract buyers! What are they thinking?
Do you think maybe the industry could give awards for the worst photos in the mls? (I’m trying to think of an appropriate prize!)
April 2nd, 2010 at 3:24 pm
I think they should award them something or bring more attention to the issue because if the owner new how crappy some of the photos looked I am sure they would be rather disappointed. It’s really pathetic!
July 29th, 2010 at 11:06 am
One more reason sellers need to do their homework…
July 30th, 2010 at 8:08 pm
LOL, nothing more aggravating than getting on the MLS to check out listings only to find pictures that are out of focus, taken 2 years before the listing, or even worse: no pictures at all (for which my local board is now fining agents). Good post, Alex.
Alex @ Maui Real Estate Search´s last blog ..Share Your Thoughts About the “Best of Maui”
July 30th, 2010 at 8:13 pm
Hey Alex, thanks for visiting the website. I changed your link and added @ in between your name and “Maui Real Estate Search” so it gives you a better link and doesn’t add your name in the link. Just letting you know. Thanks for the comment!
Funny how lazy agents are, right?
July 30th, 2010 at 11:33 pm
Great post. What drives me nuts a much as the bad photos is the agents that don’t write a description and/or don’t fill in the information on the property.
August 1st, 2010 at 12:52 am
These are really some of the very bad photos I have seen in past few months regarding the MLS…I don’t think it will be worse than these…:(
August 1st, 2010 at 1:07 am
What a treasure trove of trash! The past owners must have swam in it. Either that or they used a specific room as their trash room. On a more serious note, I agree 100% with the fact that some agents don’t take pictures of their listings. What is up with that? At least that one polaroid picture existed. It the mls I use, you can search for only houses with pictures as part of your criteria if you choose to. Why should I have to? It seems like those listings should be distributed to agents who care enough about the seller to market it correctly. I could rant forever on how much that irritates me.
August 1st, 2010 at 2:34 am
What were the previous owners doing in such a horrible place like that! A house full of trash is definitely bad for business! Tsk, tsk, tsk, sellers need to be more alert and become aware that some agents out there are definitely not doing their job at all.
August 3rd, 2010 at 2:44 pm
Who even takes pictures of all that trash and puts it up on mls?
I mean…really…who does that?
Austin Mortgage@YourKeywords´s last blog ..Cash-In Refinancings Rise in Second Quarter
August 13th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
I almost spit out my coffee when I saw those pictures… classic. I am always after my guy for taking pictures with crap laying everywhere or trash cans next to the front door etc… You should see his video’s.
August 13th, 2010 at 6:01 pm
Thank you for the really good laugh. I think you’re on to something here… seriously.
I work with a guy who used to take really bad shot, but after much critiquing, he is getting better.
August 18th, 2010 at 1:13 am
Polaroids? Do they even still make film for those cameras? I’ve got loads of photos like this from homes I’ve inspected recently in San Diego. Come on sellers, ever heard of staging?