Do drone photos help sell a house?

The short answer

There is some evidence that drone imagery is associated with better listing outcomes, but not much, and none of it measures what most agents mean by "drone photos": a few aerial stills on a U.S. single-family listing. The best study we could verify looked at drone video and 360-degree tours in Singapore and found both linked to more buyer interest, a higher chance of selling and higher prices. That's encouraging, not proof. The practical answer is that aerials help when they show something buyers care about and can't see from the ground, and add little when they don't.

Where the "68% faster" number comes from

The figure shows up on photographer websites, drone blogs and listing presentations, usually as "homes with aerial images sell 68% faster." When a February 2024 Digital Camera World article reported it, the body credited the statistics to a luxury real estate company's blog while the page's own summary credited the National Association of Realtors. Neither version linked to a study, and neither described a sample, a time period, a market or what "faster" was measured against.

We couldn't find a NAR report, an MLS analysis or an academic paper that produced the number. That doesn't mean aerials don't help; it means this particular statistic can't be checked, so we don't repeat it as a fact, and you shouldn't put it in a listing presentation. If a seller asks, the honest version is the rest of this guide.

The study we could verify

Seow Eng Ong, Woei Chyuan Wong, Davin Wang and Choon Peng Lai published "The effects of visual technology on price discovery for residential listings and transactions" in the International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis (vol. 17, no. 2, pp. 372–394, published online in September 2022; doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-07-2022-0099, summary on IDEAS/RePEc). Using Singapore residential listings from 2015 to 2018, the authors report that offering drone video or a 360-degree virtual tour increased the rate at which potential buyers arrived, the probability of a sale and the selling price. Listings with virtual tours also stayed on the market longer, which the authors read as buyers taking more time with more information. They describe it as the first paper to look at drone video's effect on property outcomes.

Three cautions before you quote it. It's Singapore, a market dominated by high-rise housing, not a Northern Virginia colonial on half an acre. It studies drone video alongside 360 tours, and the summary reports the two together. And like most listing studies it's observational: the listings that paid for drone video may also have had bigger marketing budgets or more experienced agents. It's a real signal, not a guarantee.

What the professional-photo research does and doesn't tell you

Most of the statistics people attach to drones are really about photo quality in general. Redfin, for example, has published results from a 2013 analysis comparing listings shot with professional cameras to listings with amateur photos, finding that professionally photographed homes in most price ranges sold faster and closer to list price (Redfin, 2019 summary). That's evidence that better photos matter. It says nothing specific about aerials, and the post doesn't publish the sample or method. We cover it properly in professional vs iPhone listing photos.

Why aerials can help anyway

What follows is our experience, not a measured result. Buyers decide in seconds whether to click into a listing, and then they go looking for answers: how big is the lot, what's behind the house, how close is the water, the park or the highway, what does the roof look like. Ground photos answer some of that. An aerial answers several at once. A single frame from 150 feet can show the property lines, the tree cover, the pool, the detached garage and the cul-de-sac, which would otherwise take a paragraph of listing text nobody reads.

Aerials also help buyers who can't visit yet. Out-of-town and relocating buyers use them to understand the setting before they book a flight, the same way they use a 3D tour to understand the layout.

Listings where drone usually earns its place

• Acreage, farms and horse properties. The land is the listing; see our land photography page.
• Waterfront. The shoreline, the pier and the open water read best from above.
• Homes backing to parks, golf courses or open space. The view behind the house is often the second-best photo in the set.
• Large or unusual lots. A pie-shaped lot at the end of a cul-de-sac looks ordinary from the street.
• New construction communities. A flyover shows the street plan, the amenities and what's still being built.
• Location stories. A short walk to a town center or a station is easier to show than to describe.
• Outdoor features. Pools, outdoor kitchens, sport courts, new roofs and solar arrays.

Listings where it usually doesn't

• A unit in a tall condo building, unless the building's amenities or the view are the story.
• Heavily wooded lots in summer, where the aerial shows a canopy and not much else. Leaf-off months are better.
• A tight lot with nothing to show from above. A rowhouse roof is rarely a selling point, though a roof deck can be.

And one firm rule: aerials should never be framed to hide something a buyer would want to know, like a highway, a power line corridor or a commercial building next door. Leaving those out of frame isn't the same as misrepresenting them, but cropping a photo so a buyer is surprised at the showing costs you trust and can raise disclosure problems. Show the property honestly.

Stills, video or both

Aerial stills belong in the MLS gallery. Most listings need two to five: a three-quarter view of the house and lot, a higher frame showing the setting, and one or two that make a specific point, like the water or the backyard. Put them early in the gallery when the land is the selling point, but the front exterior usually stays the cover photo. Aerial video clips are for listing films and vertical reels, where a slow reveal of the house and its surroundings works as an opening shot.

At KONAH, drone stills can be added to any shoot for $50, an aerial video clip for $100, and Photography + Drone bundles photos and aerials for $250. Prices come from our live catalog.

Rules, authorizations and lead times

Any listing flight is a commercial flight under the FAA's Part 107 rule, so the pilot needs a remote pilot certificate even if it's the agent's own listing. Around Washington, the airspace adds lead time: inside the FAA's restricted zone around Reagan National the pilot files an FAA/TSA authorization before the flight, which takes days, and near airports like Dulles and BWI the pilot requests LAANC authorization, which usually takes minutes. Our guides to drone rules in DC and Northern Virginia and drone rules in Maryland explain both, and the free airspace checker shows what an address needs. For hiring a pilot in specific places, see drone photography in DC and in Maryland.

How to tell whether it worked for your listings

You won't get a controlled experiment out of one listing, but you can watch for signals. Note the portal views and saves in the first week, then add aerials to a listing that went live without them and see whether the trend changes. Ask buyer's agents what their clients said about the setting. Over a year of listings, compare showing requests for similar homes with and without aerials. None of that is proof either, but it's better evidence for your market than a statistic nobody can trace.

What to tell a seller who asks

Keep it honest and specific: "There isn't solid research proving drone photos sell homes faster, and I won't quote you a number I can't back up. What I can tell you is what aerials will show about your property that the ground photos can't." Then name it: the lot, the water, the view, the setting. Sellers respect a reason more than a statistic, and the reason is the part that actually helps buyers.