Photo Rights & Licensing
What you can do
with your photos.
Every Villa Views shoot comes with a license. Here is what it covers, in plain English, so nobody has to guess six months from now. The full license text is at the bottom of this page.
The short version
You license the photos.
You do not buy them.
This is how professional photography works everywhere, and it is worth understanding once rather than discovering it during a dispute. Villa Views keeps the copyright to every image, video, tour, and floor plan we produce. What you buy is the right to use that work to market a specific property, for as long as you represent it.
That license is worldwide and fully paid. There are no usage caps, no per-platform fees, and no renewals while the listing is yours. Put the photos on the MLS, your website, social, print, email, wherever the listing needs to appear.
The details
Four things agents
actually ask.
How long can I use them?
For as long as you represent the property. A week, a year, however long the listing runs. The license is tied to your representation, not to a calendar date, so there is nothing to track and nothing to renew.
When you stop representing the property, the license ends with it.
The listing expired and another agent took it over. Can they use my photos?
Not automatically. The license belongs to the agent who ordered the shoot. It does not travel with the property, and it is not something the seller can hand to someone else.
The incoming agent can license the existing media directly from us. The fee is comparable to what a fresh shoot of that property would cost, and the practical advantage is speed: once the invoice is paid we hand the files over immediately, so the listing goes back up the same day instead of waiting on a reshoot and a weather window.
Can my brokerage use them?
Yes. Your brokerage can use the media to market that property while you represent it, under your license. The license covers the one property it was shot for.
Can I edit them, or run them through an AI tool?
No. The delivered files are not to be modified. That specifically includes virtual staging, twilight conversion, sky swaps, property line and GIS overlays, and AI editing or enhancement.
This is not us being precious about it. Those edits carry real MLS and disclosure risk when they are done badly, and the work still carries our name. We offer every one of them as a service, so if a listing needs virtual staging or a twilight exterior, order it and we will produce it properly.
Short-term rentals & commercial
Airbnb and VRBO are
a separate license.
A standard listing license covers marketing a property for sale. It does not cover using the photos to run a business on the property afterward.
If the property will be listed on Airbnb, VRBO, Furnished Finder, or used in ongoing commercial marketing, that is a separate commercial license: a one-time $200 flat fee, no revenue percentage and no annual renewal. It is its own product, not an upgrade to the standard license, and it can be added to an existing shoot after the fact.
The full license
The exact text you accept
at download.
Everything above is a plain-English summary. This is the operative license, reproduced word for word from the acknowledgement in your client portal, which must be accepted before any files can be downloaded.
License for Use of Photography
[Client], who purchased a license for these photos, is hereby authorized to a worldwide, limited, fully-paid license to use said photographs and media for the purposes of marketing [FullAddress] for as long as [Client] represents the property. This license does not grant or constitute a transfer of ownership of any intellectual property rights, which are all explicitly held by [TeamMember]. Editing or modifying the photos is strictly prohibited. This includes but is not limited to: Virtual Staging, Twilight Conversion, Sky Swaps, Property Lines (GIS) and Ai editing.
Bracketed fields are filled in automatically with your name, the property address, and the photographer. If you have a question about what your license covers on a specific listing, get in touch before you use the files rather than after.