How to Make a Virtual House Tour: Tips & Templates

Creating a virtual house tour doesn't have to be complicated or costly. Whether you're showcasing a new house on the market, creating a tour for a new apartment building, or sharing your living space, you don't need expensive equipment or advanced editing skills. In this blog post, we'll walk you through a step-by-step guide that will help you create a stunning virtual tour using just the tools you have on hand. Get ready to turn your home into a digital experience that anyone can explore!

What is a virtual house tour?

A virtual house tour is an online tour of a property that allows potential buyers or renters to explore a home remotely as if they were there in person. Some tours offer 360-degree panoramic views or even interactive 3D models, enabling users to navigate through different rooms and spaces.

Virtual tours often include detailed information about each room, such as dimensions, features, and special highlights. Some advanced virtual tours also incorporate video walkthroughs, voiceovers, and floor plans to provide a comprehensive and personalized experience. These tours have become increasingly popular in real estate, as buyers are starting their research online rather than in-person. These tours offer an authentic and more trustworthy experience which is especially helpful when physical visits are challenging. Plus, you can cut down on in-person showings and limit your showings to interested buyers.

But you don’t need to invest in all the expensive equipment or work with an agency to make a professional tour video! With just your smartphone, some natural light, and a simple video editor, you can create an impressive and immersive experience.

Getting started: What you need

Ready to jump in? You probably already have all the tools you need to record a virtual house tour! Here’s what you’ll need:

• A smartphone or camera
• A microphone (The one on your headphones will do just fine)
• A video editor Animoto is free and comes equipped with tons of templates and beginner-friendly tools

Optional:

• A tripod
• A simple light kit
• A gimbal to keep your video steady

Quick filming tips & prep

• Nail the lighting: Lighting is the most important element of your video. Go through each room and take a photo to see what changes you need to make. Make sure that the curtains are open and your property is filled with natural light. Still not bright enough? Try out a portable LED light to illuminate the room as you walk through.
• Plan your walkthrough: Want to record your video in fewer takes? Lay out your route! Make sure that you hit all the key rooms and features and walk through the house in the most natural and fluid way. If you’re holding the camera, you’ll also want to make sure that you can easily navigate and open up doors with one hand.
• Tidy up: Your camera will pick up a lot of detail, for better or worse. Make sure that before you start recording all surfaces are wiped down, you’ve swept up any debris, and all cleaning supplies are tucked away.
• Stage your home: Help buyers imagine what it will be like to live in this home or apartment by staging it! If this isn’t viable with your space, you can also use virtual stager to digitally furnish your photos.
• Supplement with photos: If you’re not able to nail the lighting or get to a certain area in your virtual house tour, use photos! You can add detailed photos to your video to emphasize key features of your home.

-Plan an intro or outro: You don’t have to be on camera, but even just a short hello or thank you in your video could go a long way to connect with potential clients. Make sure that they know where to learn more, contact your team, or apply by adding a call to action at the end.

How to create professional tour videos with Animoto

So now you have a lot of footage of your home… but what do you do with it? Animoto will help you to transform this raw tour footage into a professional video. And you don’t need any video editing experience to do so! Just sign up for a free account and get started.

Step 1: Choose a template

We make getting started super simple by providing you with professionally designed video templates. These templates serve as a great starting point for your videos by providing you with a narrative flow and placeholders for your photos, videos, and text.

This template was created with a virtual apartment tour in mind, but it can easily be edited for any property. We’ll show you how to add your own photos and videos, change the colors, and use your video to tell the story of your property.

Looking for another template? Explore our real estate category or check out this blog for even more ideas.

step 2: Upload your media

Once you’re in your video workspace, you can upload all of your video clips and photos to Animoto. Just import them from your device or cloud storage platform and watch as they load into your media tray.

Don’t worry, you can trim and edit your video clips once they are fully uploaded.

Want to record a webcam video? You can do so right in Animoto! Just click the record button at the top to start recording a friendly welcome message to introduce yourself or the property. If you’re feeling camera shy, you can also choose to record a voice-over and speak directly to your audience.

step 3: drag, drop, and edit

To add your media to your video, just drag and drop them into the placeholders. You can always scale, trim, and adjust the volume of your video clips by clicking on them and selecting from our simple video editing tools.

To add more media, you can either add another media frame to your block by clicking on the Media Frames button just below the text icon, or add another block. When you add another block, you can choose from a variety of text, media, and mixed layouts. Then just repeat the steps above to add your own content.

step 4: add text

Tell your story by adding text to your video! You can add information like the location, neighborhood highlights, apartment features, rent, square footage, pet policies, and more.

step 5: apply your brand

Now, let’s tie it all together by applying your brand! This will help to grow your agency’s recognition and add a professional touch to your video.

With Animoto, you can upload your own logo, add custom colors, and even upload a custom font. Then, you can apply these design changes to your video with a single click by creating a Saved Brand. Now, every video you make will reflect your own professional brand.

Step 6: finishing touches

Music sets the mood of your video! Each template comes preloaded with a license-free music track. You can stick with this song if you like it, or explore the hundreds of other songs available! Here’s a roundup of license-free songs we recommend for real estate videos.

And if you want to add a little something extra to highlight key features or add movement to your virtual house tour, consider adding elements! These animated stickers come in a variety of shapes like circles, arrows, and even CTA buttons that you can “stick” right on top of your video. Check out these real-estate-exclusive ones we created just for you!

Step 7: share away!

Just like that, you have a professional virtual house tour made with only a couple video clips, some photos, and your brand.

Create your virtual house or apartment tour today

Feeling ready to take on your next tour, share your latest listing, or promote an open house? We’ve got your back! Here are some more templates to help you hit the ground running.

NEW REAL ESTATE LISTING

Want to create an eye-catching video to promote the latest listings to hit the market? Here are some templates for you!

Both templates offer a sleek and modern design to set your photos against. And once you have some tour footage ready to go, you can simple drag and drop it in to create a cohesive and engaging video. It’s really that easy!

OPEN HOUSE PROMO

Now it’s time to close the deal with an in-person viewing! Use this open house promo template to get viewers excited about seeing your property IRL. You can include virtual tour footage here to entice them and create a “sneak peek” of what they’ll get to see in person.

If you found this helpful, don’t forget to tag us so we can see and share it too.

Happy video making!