Camera ready.

Chapter one · Before the camera arrives

Your photographs and film are booked, and this is the part of the process I care most about. Everything that follows — the enquiries, the viewings, the offers — is decided by what your home looks like on a screen at nine o'clock at night.

Buyers do not walk past your house any more. They scroll past it. Your first photograph gets somewhere near a second and a half of their attention, and in that second and a half they decide whether to look at the other twenty-nine or move on to the next home on the list.

Which is why I do not send an agent with a phone. I use Harry and Rudy at Show and Sell Media, who shoot property for a living, and I give them the time to do it properly. That is my side of it.

Your side is the preparation, and I will be honest with you: it matters more than the camera does. A tidy, bright, warm home photographed well looks extraordinary. A cluttered one photographed well still looks cluttered — the lens is very good at seeing the things you stopped noticing years ago.

So this guide is the whole job, written down: what I need from you before the day, what to do with the fortnight in between, what to do in every room, and what happens on the day and after it. Read it once now and once the week before. Anything you are unsure about, ring me — I would far rather have the conversation than have you guess.

You cannot photograph your way out of a room that has not been prepared.

Michael

Michael Brownsett · Founder & director

07515 720 054 · michael@brownsett.co.uk

eXp UK Best Newcomer 2025 · Yorkshire Prestige Best Independent Estate Agent 2026/27

Your agent, start to finish

Chapter two · Your appointment

Confirmed appointment

• Date — your shoot date
• Arriving — your shoot's arrival time
• Please allow — the full booked duration of your shoot
• Package — your chosen package
• At — your home

One appointment produces everything your home is marketed with — the photographs, the film, the floorplan and the images the brochure is built from.

There is no second shoot, so the house needs to be ready when the door opens rather than ready by lunchtime. Chapters four and five are the whole preparation, and they are worth starting the moment you have read them.

Someone needs to be at home to let Harry or Rudy in, but you do not need to follow them round. I may not be there at the start — I will be there before they leave to record the introduction to camera.

If the date no longer works, or the weather looks genuinely awful for the outside shots, ring me. Moving it costs nothing. Shooting a house that is not ready costs you buyers.

Done before the day

• Your details emailed back to me — chapter three
• Windows cleaned, inside and out
• Garden cut, edged and tidied
• Every bulb in the house working
• Small repairs done — chapter four
• Cars off the drive, bins out of sight

Need to move it?

Ring me on 07515 720 054. The earlier the better — these slots book up quickly.

Chapter three · Paperwork

Before your home can go live I have identity checks to complete — every estate agent in the country does, by law. They are quick, they are done electronically, and they need five things from every person named on the deeds. Not just whoever I have been speaking to.

What I need — for every named owner

• Full legal names — Exactly as they appear on the title deeds and on your passport or driving licence — middle names included, no shortened versions.
• Email addresses — One each, please, rather than a shared one. Your paperwork, your approval links and your MBSP login all arrive this way.
• Phone numbers — A mobile for each of you, so I can reach whichever of you is nearest the phone.
• Dates of birth — Used only for the identity check. It is the one detail people hesitate over, and it is the one the check cannot run without.
• Addresses, where they differ — Only needed for an owner who does not live at the property — an executor, a landlord, a name on the deeds who moved out years ago.

How to send them

Just reply to my email. One reply, everybody's details in it. No forms, no portal, no attachments to wrestle with.

michael@brownsett.co.uk

Before launch

The checks have to be complete before your home can appear on the portals. They are the one thing that can hold a launch up, and they take minutes to clear once I have the details.

Every owner

If two names are on the deeds I need two sets. Probate sales need every executor; a company sale needs the directors.

Your details are held securely, used only for the identity checks and the sale itself, and never passed to anyone who is not part of your move.

Chapter four · Preparation

You are moving anyway. Everything in this chapter is work you were going to do in six weeks' time — you are simply doing it before the camera arrives instead of after.

Start with the packing. Not the sentimental sort — the honest sort. Anything you will not need before you move goes into a box, and the boxes go into the loft, the garage or a friend's spare room. Half-empty rooms photograph beautifully. Full ones do not.

Then the small jobs. The dripping tap, the blown bulb, the door that sticks, the cracked tile you stopped seeing in 2019. Individually none of them matter. Together they tell a buyer the house has not been looked after, and that thought is very difficult to unthink.

Book the window cleaner for the week of the shoot rather than the month before. Dirty glass takes the light out of every single interior photograph, and it is the one thing that cannot be fixed afterwards.

The jobs worth doing

• Pack away everything you will not need before the move
• Windows cleaned inside and out, the same week
• Every bulb working, and matching — warm white throughout
• Touch up scuffed paint; fill the picture holes you will not need
• Lawn cut and edged, borders weeded, hedges squared off
• Jet-wash the drive, the path and the patio if you can
• Deep clean the kitchen and bathrooms — glass, taps, grout

A fortnight of tidying is the cheapest marketing you will ever buy.

Chapter five · The staging guide

The night before, walk the house with this page in your hand. The rule underneath all of it is the same one: surfaces clear, lights on, curtains open, nothing personal on show.

Kitchen

Every worktop clear — kettle and one bowl of fruit is the most that stays out. Toaster, blender, knife block, washing-up liquid and tea towels all away. Nothing on the fridge door. Bin out of shot. Polish the taps, the hob and the splashback.

Living room

Cushions plumped and squared, throws folded rather than draped. Remotes, chargers and cables in a drawer. Television off — a black screen photographs better than a paused one. Coffee table down to two objects.

Bedrooms

The best bedding you own, ironed if you possibly can. Bedside tables down to a lamp and a book. Wardrobe and drawer fronts closed, floors completely clear, nothing stored under the bed that shows.

Bathrooms

Clear the bath, the sink and the windowsill entirely — shampoos, razors, toothbrushes, all of it. Toilet seats down, matching towels folded on the rail, mats straight. Washing baskets out of the room entirely. Mirrors and shower glass polished dry.

Hall and stairs

Shoes, coats, bags, post, buggies and the dog lead all out of sight. This is the first photograph a buyer sees after the front elevation, and it is the one most often ruined by a pile of trainers.

Garden and outside

Cars off the drive and, if the neighbours will oblige, off the frontage too. Bins hidden. Furniture straightened and cushions out, hoses coiled, toys and trampolines away. Sweep the path and the doorstep.

Every room

All lights on, all curtains and blinds fully open, all doors open. Family photographs, certificates, calendars and paperwork put away — buyers should be imagining themselves in the house, not reading about you.

The three that ruin a set

A wheelie bin in the frame. A car on the drive. A cluttered worktop. They are the three I see most, they are all free to fix, and every one of them costs you enquiries.

Chapter six · Shoot day

Harry or Rudy will arrive at the time on your appointment page and work through the house room by room. Here is the shape of the morning, so nothing about it is a surprise.

Before they knock · the hour before

Lights on everywhere, blinds and curtains fully open, heating on in winter. Cars off the drive. Pets out of the house if you can manage it, and their beds and bowls put away.

They arrive · first ten minutes

A quick walk of the house to plan the order and find the light. If a room genuinely is not ready, say so now — it is far easier to reorder the shoot than to reshoot it.

Room by room · three passes each

Every room is shot at least three times over: once for the stills, once for the film, once for the floorplan scan. It is why the appointment is as long as it is. Stay a room ahead or a room behind, and please do not tidy while they are shooting.

The introduction · before they leave

I may not be there at the start, but I will be there for this — the piece to camera that opens your film. You are welcome to watch, and equally welcome to put the kettle on instead.

• 90 mins — On site for the Superior package.
• 2 hrs 30 — On site for the Ultimate Collection.
• 3 passes — Minimum, in every single room.

Your photographers

Harry and Rudy · Show and Sell Media

• Property specialists — this is all they shoot
• Stills, film and floorplan from the one visit
• Booked for the whole slot, never rushed

I use them because the marketing is the single biggest thing standing between your home and the right buyer. It is not the place to save money.

Chapter seven · After the shoot

The moment the door closes behind the photographer, the clock starts. Nothing about your home appears anywhere until you have seen all of it and told me you are happy.

Within 48 hours · the content lands

Show and Sell Media edit and return everything — the photographs, the film and the floorplan — within two days of the shoot.

Then · I build the advert

I write your property up myself and put the whole advert together — the description, the photographs in the order buyers should meet them, the floorplan and the film.

Then · it comes to you, in full

The complete advert arrives for your approval. Not a summary of it — the actual thing a buyer will see, exactly as they will see it.

Your changes · as many as you like

A photograph you would rather not use, a room named wrongly, a detail about the house I have missed. Say so. You know your home better than I do.

Launch · once you say yes

Your approval is the trigger. Nothing goes live before it, and once it is given the marketing goes out properly — which is where the next two chapters start earning their place.

• 48 hrs — From shoot to finished content back in my hands.
• Nothing — Goes public until you have approved every part of it.

What you will be approving

• The write-up — the full description, room by room
• The photographs — every image, in running order
• The floorplan — check the room names and the layout
• The film — the walkthrough and my introduction

Read the description out loud before you approve it. If it does not sound like your home, tell me.

Chapter eight · Before every viewing

The photographs earn the viewing. The ten minutes before the doorbell decide what the buyer feels when they walk in — and that feeling is what they are actually buying. Run this list every time. It becomes muscle memory by the third one.

• Every light on, in every room, whatever the weather
• Curtains and blinds fully open, internal doors open
• Heating on twenty minutes before in winter; windows open ten minutes before in summer
• Worktops and surfaces clear; washing-up done and put away
• Beds made, towels straight, toilet seats down
• Bins emptied, airers folded away, washing baskets hidden
• Toys into one box; the box into a cupboard
• Pets out of the house if you can; beds, bowls and trays away
• Cars off the drive so they can pull straight on
• Doorstep swept, doormat straight, front door glass wiped

• Light — A dim room reads as a small room. Lamps on as well as the big light.
• Warmth — A cold house feels like an expensive house to run. Worth the twenty minutes.
• Air — No frying, no strong plug-ins. Fresh air beats air freshener every time.

Chapter nine · The viewing

Where you have asked me to carry out the viewings, I do them myself. No junior, no keyholder, nobody meeting your buyer for the first time on your doorstep.

That matters because a viewing is not a tour. I know why the buyer is moving, what they have just lost out on, what they can borrow and what they will compromise on — and I show your home against that, not against a script.

Which is also why the house is better without you in it. Buyers will not open a wardrobe, criticise a bathroom or stand in a bedroom working out where their bed goes while the owner is stood behind them. They will do all three the moment they think nobody is listening, and every one of those things is a buying signal.

If you cannot go out, that is completely fine. Settle in one room — the kitchen or the garden — say hello, and let me take them round. Do not follow us. Do not apologise for anything. And please do not sell: that part is mine, and I am better at it than I am at anything else.

Afterwards I ring you with the feedback as it was given to me — the good and the awkward. If three buyers say the same thing about your home, that is not an insult. That is the market talking, and it is worth listening to early.

Leave the house. Take the dog. Let them fall for it without an audience.

What helps

• Being out, or in one room and out of the way
• Telling me anything a buyer will ask — the boiler's age, the parking, the neighbours
• Saying yes to short-notice viewings where you can
• Leaving the reset done, even for a second viewing

What does not

• Following us from room to room
• Apologising for the decor, the size or the mess
• Discussing price, or how long it has been on
• Turning down a viewing because the house is not perfect