Real Estate from an Aerial View

Without doubt, the most flattering view of a $32 million mansion on California's Pacific coast is an aerial one.  Contributor Douglas Thron put together this epic drone video of an extremely high end residential property located on Pebble Beach golf course in northern California.  It's on the southwest-facing side of the Monterey Peninsula, opposite the city of Moneterey.  The bird's eye views of this gem, tucked in close to one of the world's most famous golf courses, is simply spectacular. 

By virtue of space constraints, building restrictions, and the ever-present allure of living in the Bay Area, San Francisco, California is perennially among the most expensive real estate markets in the United States.  With seemingly ever-rising home prices, the City by the Bay has become a magnet for the ultra-rich who are not put off by sky-high prices.  In this video, top contributor and pilot Douglas Thron used a drone to help create a promotional video for a high-end penthouse condominium in the heart of the city.  

One of the benefits of using drones to market real estate is that it's easy to make "establishing shots" showing the relationship of the subject property to the surrounding area.  Contributor 8 Fifty Productions, which does a lot of aerial videography work related to Florida real estate, created this beautiful drone video showing the area around Panama City Beach on the Florida panhandle.

Drones are an ideal tool to help market high rise residential real estate.  An aerial video of a luxury apartment or condo complex can do much to show off a property, especially if the building is in a scenic location.  Sky Candy Studios used a DJI Phantom 4 drone and a gimbal-stabilized ground camera to create this impressive promotional video for the Gallery Apartments, a new development in Chicago's North Loop.

A home doesn't have to be a hilltop or beachside mansion to benefit from a marketing video created by drone. Even less glamorouos suburban properties can benefit from the bird's eye views of the house and the surrounding neighborhood.  In this video by Cloudcutter Productions, you'll see what a drone video does to show off a suburban home listed for sale near Salt Lake City, Utah.    

Of the types of residential properties which can benefit from using marketing videos with drone footage, lakefront homes are near the top of the list.  Only with the aerial footage afforded by a drone can the property and its relationship to the lake be properly seen and appreciated.  Contributor Sky Candy Studios used a DJI Inspire 2 to create this beautiful promotional video of a house on a large lake near St. Paul, Minnesota.

Drone videos of homes can be used for more than just real estate listings.  Remodeling and landscape projects can be aerially filmed as a way to effectively market the services of the designers and contractors.  In this video for a landscaping company by professional drone piloting company Heights Aerial Media, a drone was used to provide aerial footage highlighting a job at a New Jersey home.  

Drone video footage is becoming a must-have tool for marketing residential properties which have boat access.  The bird's eye footage afforded by drones are by far the best way to show use of the property for marine recreation.  Contributor 8 Fifty Productions created this beautiful promotional video of a harborside apartment complex in Destin, Florida, providing an aerial view of the boating lifestyle awaiting the new owner.  Destin lies on the western side of the Florida panhandle, on what's known as the Emerald Coast.  

Given the scale and sophistication of its real estate markets, it's no surprise that the United States has been the leader in using drones to market real estate.  That being said, the practice is spreading to other parts of the world.  In this video, you'll see how drone footage was used to market a high end home in Hong Kong, one of the world's most expensive real estate markets.  

Drones are slowly being incorporated in to new parts of the business sector. From news-gathering organizations to construction companies and beyond, they’re proving a reliable tool for businesses far and wide. UAVs have been used to showcase the exterior of homes and condos in real estate, but now they’re being used inside too. Check out this HD micro drone video by Nick Lang, he’ll fly a Shendrones Squirt V2 through a home’s interior capturing all the angles potential buyers could want to see in a property.

Small FPV drones known as cinewhoops are finding use in real estate marketing in part because they can capture the outside and the inside of a house in a single shot.  It's a perfect "mission" for these small drones, which (unlike larger drones such as the DJI Mavic series) can safely be flown indoors.  Capturing the "outside to inside" transition (or vice versa) makes for very entertaining content.  Witness this great tour of a home in Oakland, California by elstevedore, note the "grand entrance" through the open door at the :50 mark.  

While gimbal-stabilized drones have been used to showcase real estate for some time, it's only recently that FPV drones have been employed to show residential properties from unique angles and perspectives.  One of the most interesting techniques used by FPV pilots for these projects is the "one shot" video, in which the inside and outside of a home is shown in a single uninterrupted sequence.  A great example is this FPV tour of a house in the Normandy region of France by After8_FPV, which was picked for the FPV Pilots to Watch list.