We sell three listing videos and the names don't tell you much. Here's what actually changes between them, in the order it changes the video you get back.
Short version if you're in a hurry: Highlight is one lens and a clean edit, Cinematic adds a second lens and the variety that comes with it, and Luxury is shot differently from the start and cut by a different editor.
Highlight, $400, about 60 seconds
One wide lens, a 9mm, on every shot. We walk the house room by room the same way every time: exterior, entry, kitchen, living, beds, baths, yard, plus any amenity you've asked us to make sure we get. It takes about thirty to forty-five minutes on site.
The edit is cuts, speed ramps, stabilisation and a colour grade. It does the job it's meant to do, which is show a buyer the whole house in a minute without making them work for it.
This is the right video for most listings. If your buyer is local, the house is straightforward, and the video's job is to be the thing people watch before they decide to come see it, you're done here.
Cinematic, $550, one to two minutes
Everything above, then we swap to a 24-70mm zoom and shoot the house a second time. That's the whole difference and it's a bigger one than it sounds.
The wide lens gives you the room. The zoom gives you the medium shots and the tight ones: the counter, the fixture, the light coming through a window. Cutting between those three distances is most of what people are responding to when they call a video "cinematic". It's why the extra $150 buys something you can see rather than something you have to take on faith.
The cost is time. Two passes with a lens swap between them puts us over an hour on site, so it's worth telling your seller the shoot is longer.
Choose this when the house has details worth a close-up, when the listing is going to carry a bit of a campaign behind it, or when you want the video to hold up on your own feed and not only on the MLS.
Luxury, $900, one to three minutes
This one is different in kind rather than in degree, and it starts before we press record.
A Highlight or a Cinematic is shot systematically and assembled afterwards. A Luxury is shot for the edit. We plan long arcing moves that are built to speed ramp into each other, so the video travels through the house instead of cutting through it. Rooms get shot knowing what they're going to sit next to. That takes real time on site and real thinking beforehand.
It also goes to a different editor. Bigger speed ramps, creative transitions, day-to-night, and the kind of pacing you'd expect from something made to be watched all the way through rather than skimmed. Both lenses are on the job.
Choose this when the house is genuinely high end, when the video is the marketing rather than part of it, or when you're using the listing to build your own brand and you want a piece that stands on its own.
What doesn't change
The same person shoots every one of them, and it's one of us rather than a contractor we've never met. Every tier delivers in 72 hours. Every tier is shot in the same visit as your photos, so there's one appointment on your seller's calendar no matter what you book.
How to choose in ten seconds
- Standard listing, local buyer, needs a video. Highlight.
- Nice house, details worth showing, you're posting it yourself. Cinematic.
- The video is the pitch. Luxury.
If you're between two of them, book the lower one. We'd rather you saw what a Highlight looks like on your own listing and moved up next time than paid for a Luxury on a house that didn't need one.
The one thing worth more than upgrading
A tier up on video does less for a listing than a house that's ready to be filmed. Cleared counters, matched bulbs and cars off the driveway change every frame in every tier, and they cost nothing. That's the whole reason we send a prep guide with every confirmation.
All three tiers, what they cost at your square footage, and what's bundled into each package are on the services page. Finished videos from real Bay Area listings are in the portfolio.