Increasing numbers of metro Realtors turn to YouTube

"Leave Britney alone!" "Chocolate rain." "Don't Tase me, bro!"

Those popular YouTube videos have had their moments in the pop culture spotlight, but what about: "This beautiful property, located on 3 1/2 acres ... ?"

As the real estate industry searches for new and inexpensive ways of reaching buyers and sellers, house ads and Realtor testimonials are competing with celebrity bloopers and stupid pet tricks on YouTube.

A recent search of "real estate Minnesota" produced more than 2,000 real estate-related videos.

It's not just frustrated homeowners who are getting into the act. With support from an industry that is encouraging its members to embrace more digital technology, most of the YouTube real estate videos are being posted by real estate agents.

Jimmy Jensen of the Jensen Team in Rogers, Minn., was an early user of online video. He began using the site a year and a half ago because he believes video is better than a traditional photo slide show.

"Pictures only show so much," he said.

Jensen makes his own YouTube videos, which usually are shorter than 3 minutes. He narrates them and describes the most interesting features of the house. He even composed the background music.

Have watchers responded?

"All the time," he said.

Although no one has bought a house after only seeing the video, some videos have indirectly led to sales.

Jensen also markets his properties on WellcomeMat.com, one of several other real estate video websites. WellcomeMat includes additional features with its videos including a "scenes" option that allows viewers to skip to different parts of the video to see new rooms.

Jensen said that video tours can save prospective buyers a lot of time.

"I think all Realtors should be doing it," he said.

Posting a video on YouTube is nearly as easy as watching one. After signing up for a free account, users can upload videos with few restrictions.

The videos have to be less than 1 gigabyte, and usually are less than 10 minutes long. Only two things are not allowed on the site: pornography and copyrighted material, according to Google spokesperson Jake Parrillo. Also, people posting content on YouTube can't charge for access to that content. For many, YouTube may serve a more important purpose than advertising real estate.

"It's less to promote properties and more to promote yourself as an industry expert," said Greg Sax, communications manager for the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors (MAAR).

For example, one video highlights the sales success of the Jensen Team, and how it uses the Internet to sell houses.

"Make no mistake about it, this is still a very, very tough market, but we're selling houses," Jensen says confidently in a voice-over and slide show of houses they've sold

Sax said that video is a natural extension of the many online resources already being used. MAAR promotes it as a useful tool, Sax said.

MAAR even uses YouTube to promote the association and its services. Every month it posts a new edition of "The Monthly Skinny," a summary of recent market activity. Other real estate companies have linked to the videos and include them in their communication pieces.

Many agents see YouTube as a means to promote themselves just as much as the houses they sell.

Individual agents can embed YouTube video links on their own websites and blogs, said Jim Young, an office manager for Edina Realty. Edina has a partnership with a high-end video vendor that produces the videos that can be posted on Edina's website.

Young said that the videos are a reason visitors spend an average of 14 minutes on the Edina Realty site, whereas some other real estate websites have an average visit of just 3 minutes.

"The more a consumer can taste, touch, see and smell a property, the more they'll want it," he said.

The method of choice?

While most home buyers aren't going to start a home search on YouTube, Young said that video might already be the advertising method of choice for some agents rather than still photos and listings of the house.

"A picture is worth a thousand words," Young said, "but video is worth a million."

Sax expects video sites to become the first stop for prospective home buyers, who increasingly rely on the Internet for information. Some say 70 to 80 percent of all buyers start their searches on the internet.

"This [video tours] will be the first thing they look at," said Sax.

VHT is an Illinois-based real estate marketing company that began uploading its clients' videos to YouTube in mid-2008.

Since then, it has posted nearly 25,000, including more than 700 for homes in Minnesota. The company represents clients from more than 3,500 brokerages across the country. It markets on several sites, including Yahoo and Google.

VHT's vice president of marketing, Maia Tihista, said Google's purchase of YouTube means that videos posted on that site now are showing up in Google search results, and that drives more buyers to their listings.

"The YouTube postings are coming up pretty high in the search results," she said. "We knew that video was the next phase of what's going to help real estate marketers differentiate themselves."

Ever since it became an overnight sensation a few years ago, YouTube has been introducing innovations. It recently began allowing users to post videos in high definition, which features improved quality in sound and video. Users are moving to keep up with the changes.

"We are tweaking our video format so they'll be optimized in the high-definition format YouTube is now rolling out," Tihista said.

And some even expect the emergence of a site that mirrors YouTube, but focuses solely on real estate.

Eventually, YouTube and similar websites could become the advertising method of choice as agents and buyers become more tech-savvy. That means that alongside videos of musicians posting their own songs and others seeking their 15 minutes of fame, the house down the street -- like the one on Jewel Drive in Woodbury -- could become YouTube's newest star.

That video follows Pat Egan and Tara Welch of Coldwell Banker Burnet. While looking at the camera, they open the front door, greet the viewer and lead a tour.

At one point they're standing in the kitchen with the seller and talking about what it's like to raise four kids in the house, and they appear again in the basement with the seller, who is talking about the new wet bar and other improvements.

With the camera shaking, the video shows the children sledding down a backyard hill, and as it closes, there's a plea from the seller's daughter, who coyly says: "Buy my house."

Her mom smiles, and ends it with "Please."

Andrew Newman is a University of Minnesota student reporter on assignment for the Star Tribune.