8 property apps and resources to help sell your home

There’s an app for just about everything now, and selling a house is no exception. The jobs that used to need an agency’s back office (floor plans, tidy photos, a price estimate, a bit of styling) are all things you can do yourself from your phone or laptop. Here are eight tools worth knowing about when you sell your own home, and what each one is actually good for.

1. magicplan: floor plans from your phone

Buyers love a floor plan, and listings with one tend to get taken more seriously. magicplan lets you create one in minutes: walk each room, capture the corners, and the app builds a scaled plan you can export as a PDF or image. The free tier covers a couple of projects with exports included, which is plenty for one house, and there are paid plans if you need more. Either way it’s a fraction of what a draftsperson would charge. (It’s aimed partly at trades, so don’t be thrown by the sign-up.)

2. BoxBrownie: photo editing and virtual staging

Even good photos can usually be lifted a little, and BoxBrownie does it cheaply. Send your images and get them enhanced and retouched to a higher standard for a couple of dollars each. It also turns a daytime exterior into a warm dusk shot, and offers virtual staging (handy if you’ve already moved out and the rooms look bare), though staging costs more per image than a basic edit. Pair it with our real estate photography tips and your listing looks the part.

3. realestate.com.au and Domain price estimates: a starting point on value

Setting the price is one of the harder parts of selling yourself. Both realestate.com.au and Domain offer free automated estimates: type in your address and you’ll get a price range plus the property’s sales history and comparable sales nearby. Treat these as a rough starting point, not gospel, because the ranges can be wide. Our guide to the most accurate property value estimators explains how to read them and where they go wrong.

4. Houzz: design and presentation ideas

Not sure how to style a room, or worried your taste might not suit buyers? Houzz is full of photos, articles and ideas for making a home more appealing to sell. It also has a directory of designers, builders and landscapers with reviews, if you decide you’d like a hand with a specific job before you list.

5. A paint visualiser: try colours before you commit

Tired walls drag a home down, and a fresh coat is one of the cheapest ways to lift it. The big paint brands have free visualiser tools (Dulux’s Colour Visualiser is the easy one to start with) that let you upload a photo of a room and see how it looks in a different colour. It’s not perfectly accurate, but it saves a few trips to the hardware store and a wall full of sample patches before you pick.

6. Canva: flyers, brochures and social posts

Once your home is listed, a bit of DIY marketing helps. Canva is a free design tool with property-flyer and social-media templates you can drop your own photos into, so you can run off a letterbox flyer for the neighbours or a tidy post to share, without hiring a designer. It’s genuinely easy to use and the free tier does everything a private seller needs.

7. PropertyNow’s free tools: cost and value in one place

Two free tools worth using before you settle on a method and a price. Our commission savings calculator puts a typical agent commission (usually 2 to 3 per cent of the sale price) next to a flat fee, so you can see the difference on your own price in about ten seconds, usually a five-figure gap. And a free property value report pulls together an estimated value, the property’s history and nearby comparable sales, a useful second opinion when you’re settling on an asking price.

8. PropertyNow: get your listing on the major portals

The list wouldn’t be complete without the platform that actually gets your home in front of buyers. As one of Australia’s original for-sale-by-owner services, PropertyNow is a licensed agency, so we can list your property on realestate.com.au, Domain and the other major portals, with our team supporting you seven days a week. You keep control of the sale, and you keep the commission. Here’s how a private sale works.

Which tool for which job

If you’re not sure where to start, here’s the quick version:

Floor plan: magicplan
Better photos / virtual staging: BoxBrownie
Price research: realestate.com.au and Domain estimates, plus a free property value report
Styling ideas: Houzz
Paint colours: a paint-brand visualiser like Dulux’s
Flyers and social posts: Canva
Cost of selling: the commission calculator
Getting listed: PropertyNow

The bottom line

You don’t need an agency’s resources to sell your home well, because most of them now fit in your pocket. A floor plan, sharp photos, a sensible price and a fresh coat of paint are all within reach, and the tools above make each one easier. Line them up, then get your listing on the portals and let the buyers come to you.

None of the tools above are sponsored and no payment has been exchanged for their inclusion. We’ve simply found them useful for people selling their own homes.

Thinking about selling it yourself?

The apps above cover the photos, the paint and the price. When you’re ready to list, PropertyNow puts your property on the major portals with licensed agents behind you seven days a week.

See how it works

Frequently asked questions

What’s the best app for making a floor plan of my house? magicplan is a popular choice: you capture each room with your phone and it builds a scaled floor plan you can export, for a fraction of the cost of a professional draft.

Can I edit my own real estate photos? Yes. Services like BoxBrownie enhance and retouch your photos for a couple of dollars an image, and can add virtual furniture or turn a day shot into a dusk one. Good in-camera work still matters first, so start with solid photography.

How can I estimate my home’s value for free? Both realestate.com.au and Domain offer free online estimates, and a free property value report pulls comparable sales together in one place. Use them as a starting point and back your final price with recent local sales.

Do I need to pay for these tools? Some are free (the price estimates, the value report, the commission calculator, Canva), and others cost a small amount per use (floor plans, photo editing). None of them come close to an agent’s commission.