Letting type speak for itself, in my opinion, allows for cleaner more refined workflow which you’ve done well. Two things I’d like to mention which make for good layout are separation and image layout.

In this example, I use the word separation when referencing what Rob did to distinguish the images with black lines from other images and text boxes. Visually it makes a huge difference between what may seem like an amateur cut and paste brochure to a Professional well composed design. Two, layout of images.

If you’ll notice the two images at the bottom left lead your eyes to the right, up and around through the page. “They say” in Art your eyes should move around the page in a triangular motion at all times keeping with flow. Rob does a great job here. The 1st image bottom left has the big window cut off leading you into the next image, flowing into the wall. If the images were switched, image one would abruptly stop into image two and so on. There would be no flow.

Regarding Professional Designers and Agents paying for them. My experience living in Southern California even with home prices of 700K+, Agents are very cheap to dish out any money let alone $1,000.00 per listing plus photo fees. All of the Agents I’ve spoken with pay for their brochure design out of their pocket not the company. Often times using an office pre paid employee. They get very cheap when they have 4 listings or more, with separate prices, regardless of what the payoff will be.

If working with a Professional is your desired approach I would try this. Find a designer with a style you would like to work with, make up a portfolio of say 6 printed layouts and present them to the Broker of an entire office. I would be sneaky yet honest with the Broker and say “we have 20 more designs, I just can’t show them all at once”. People “WILL” steal your ideas. I wouldn’t show them all at once?

Show your best examples with the most expensive output/printed examples for your portfolio. Go for the home run not the base hit and get the entire office to join at a reasonable price. Jealousy quickly spreads when one agent’s brochures are better than the next. If you’re an Agent/Photographer, even better. You already have the trust of your peers. P.S. don’t leave your portfolio behind!! Tell a Broker you only have one Portfolio and have another meeting that day. Whatever it takes not to leave it behind? Again many will be cheap and steal your work. Just my experience.

Finally I’d like to say the first design was nice, very usable and a seller. There’s no doubt that what Rob has offered is a job well done. I hope all of us gain enough from this post to make more money in the coming weeks and months, furthering our careers financially and visually. Thanks Rob for sharing and thanks to every one else for their comments. I’ve absorbed a wealth of information and ideas from this post. Have a great week.

Thanks.

John, here is my estimated range of what you can expect to pay based on what I’ve seen nationally. My prices fall in these ranges, but for template-based designs I give price breaks, and for really customized work (multiple design concepts, photo masking, photo collages, special effects, copywriting/editing, etc.) I’m at and above the higher end.

For a postcard mailer (4″ x 6″ / 5″ x 9″ sizes), figure $150-$250. Postcard mailers typically have imagery on the front with minimal text such as a single headline, and the back has the address area, a text area, call to action, and contact information.

For an 8.5″ x 11″ 1-sided flyer, figure $200-$350. With printing on both sides (2-sided flyer), figure $300-$500. Personally, I think 2-sided flyers should always be the rule, because each side can have at least 1 large, immersive photo, and the text content can be spread out on both sides. Or if a lower/mid-range home is in a great neighborhood, you can include photos of the area, a map, or floorplan.

For an 8.5″ x 11″ 4-page brochure (11″ x 17″ sheet folded once), figure $500-$1,000. If you have an incredibly awesome panoramic shot, imagine being able to show it 17″ wide across the inside spread. That should mezmerize a buyer. A 4-page brochure can hold up to 10-12 nicely sized photos and plenty of descriptive text.

These price ranges are for design only, and keep in mind that all costs depend on what services are being offered. Lower end pricing tends to be for customized, yet simple/clean designs. Higher end pricing tends to cater towards allowing more flexibility and artistry in the design process. The more unique you want your design to be, the more you should expect to pay. Be careful about seeing prices that are significantly lower or higher than these ranges. As with buying anything, watch out for bargain basement prices. Conversely, a boutique graphic design studio or ad agency would charge beyond the higher end of the estimates below. Whomever you choose as a graphic designer, do so because you really like their work, creativity, experience and knowledge. If you’re not sure you have a discerning enough eye, get some advice and opinions from your peers.

Printing prices for flyers and brochures for the most part depend on the quantity printed and the type of paper. You can print 1-sided flyers yourself if you have a color laser printer. But for 2-sided or multi-page brochures, commercial printers are a must. I have a relationship with a quick-turnaround printing company that gives me the following pricing for 50 full-color copies on high-quality gloss paper:

8.5″ x 11″ 1-sided flyers, 50 copies for $40
8.5″ x 11″ 2-sided flyers, 50 copies for $75
8.5″ x 11″ 4-page brochure, 50 copies for $135

The price gets better the more copies you get printed.

Just out of curiosity, what would the services of a professional graphic designer cost for the typical flyer or brochure design? I realize like photography, prices will vary based on regions of the country etc., but can you give us a general idea? Thanks.

Any yes, Photoshop is not the place to be making a flyer like this:) Talk about megapixels:))

Thanks for your comments. I used Garamond throughout the flyer design, and set both website addresses in 12-point bold. I’m not clear on your reference to the san serif font. If you’re referring to the “John L. Scott” logo, I used their pre-existing company logo design and I didn’t have anything to do with choosing any fonts there.

But this gives us an opportunity to talk about “sans serif” fonts. You’re all probably familiar with Arial and Helvetica. Some of my favorites are Akzidenz-Grotesk, Frutiger, Futura, Gill Sans and Optima. A note about Gill Sans, though, is that I hate it when it’s bold. Somehow it just doesn’t work bold, especially at larger sizes. Another to consider is Avant Garde, the trouble is, I find it’s hard-to-read when used as a font for body text or in a long list of bullet points. Avant Garde is nice for a Headline or Subheadline font, though. Just for small doses of flair.

I wrote down the serif fonts you mentioned. What font did you use for the virtual tour URL? I like the san serif font for that much better than the serif font used for the agents web site address.

I do sympathize with Marilyn having to use Word–but I shouldn’t talk, I use PowerPoint for all my graphis work–but I’m moving to Flash.

Hello and thanks! Yes, I did use Photoshop and here’s why. In Larry’s original post, he made a few points about why he wants to use Photoshop-based flyer design templates. A few previous commenters (with whom I agree) countered that Adobe InDesign is the proper software for page layout. However, I thought Larry’s point about 78% of photographers having Photoshop already and not wanting to shell out up to $699 for InDesign is a valid consideration. So after sketching out a few layout ideas, it became immediately apparent that it’s worth a try.

What if the flyer design required a 2-sided layout? If the real estate agent desired to put in more photos and more text details about the property, a 2-sided flyer would be recommended. Even that could be done in Photoshop. But using InDesign would definitely be more efficient – and a must for a 4-page brochure.

Also, another thing to consider in Photoshop vs. InDesign is the eventual file size. Photoshop is a pixel-based, also called “raster” graphics program. This means that your final file output will be 1 graphic file made up entirely of pixels, which for an 8.5″ x 11″ 300 dpi file would be a couple of MB in file size. InDesign (and Adobe Illustrator) is a “vector” graphics based program. This means each element created inside InDesign – such as a colored rectangle – will use the values of height, width, angles, etc. to calculate the size and shape of each element. For an 8.5″ x 11″ design, especially a 2-sided or multi-page layout, the final file size of a print-quality PDF will be significantly less, than if each page were a Photoshop-created graphic. If I recreate this flyer with InDesign, the background gradients and text areas will be created with InDesign and 4 files will be made for each photo (3 property photos + 1 agent photo).

Marilyn, I’m not laughing about you using Microsoft Word, because you have to use what you already have and know how to use. But I do shed a tear, because I know you’re missing the significant amount of design flexibility and visual impact that can be done with Photoshop or InDesign. No house – whether it’s $80,000 or $800,000 – should suffer sitting on the market because of a lack of high impact marketing.

@ Bill Silver – Great idea about flipping the agent’s picture to face to the left. I’ll keep that in mind. Just to clarify, I didn’t state or mean to state that I don’t like people pics in a real estate flyer. I do indeed believe real estate flyers must have the agent’s photo. However, as humans are drawn to look at and recognize other human faces, the agent’s photo can be considered a design element that competes with the property photo(s). My design intent is to reduce the level of distraction for each element so that viewers can easily focus on each.

About the color gradient fading from light to dark in the green area – I tried it the reverse way and liked this better because it pops the top “headline” and the bottom-left photo. I want the text to be readable and I’m confident that at 300 dpi print quality this won’t be a problem. If you want to see a larger version (11″ wide x 8.5″ high at 72 dpi) click here:
http://www.enhancedesign.com/portfolio/realestateflyerdesign.html

Thanks!