so ive been doing real estate drone work for about a year and a half now and honestly im still not confident in my pricing. i started at like $150 for a basic exterior package which included maybe 10 edited stills and a short video clip and at the time it felt ok because i was just trying to build a portfolio. but now i have a decent client list and i feel like i undersold myself badly at the start and now some of those early clients expect that rate forever.

the thing is i see other pilots in my area charging anywhere from $200 to $600 for what seems like pretty similar deliverables. is it just location? experience? the editing quality? i genuinely dont know how to benchmark this stuff. my part 107 is current, i have liability insurance, i use a mavic 3 and do all my own editing in lightroom and premiere, so its not like im some random guy with a mini 2 and no credentials.

also wondering how you handle clients who try to haggle. had a realtor last month tell me she found someone on thumbtack for $80 and i just... i didnt even know how to respond to that.

the thumbtack thing is so real and honestly it never fully goes away. what i tell people is something like yeah you can find someone cheaper but then you get what you pay for and if the listing photos look bad that house sits on the market longer. most good realtors understand that because their commission depends on a fast sale. the ones who dont get it are usually not worth your time anyway.

on pricing ? i'm in a mid-size midwestern market and i charge $275 for stills only and $425 for stills plus video under 90 seconds. i bumped my rates about 8 months ago and lost maybe two clients who were the lowest margin ones anyway. the clients who actually value the work didnt even blink. that was kind of a wake up moment honestly. raise your rates gradually, not all at once, and frame it as a service upgrade if you can tie it to something like better editing turnaround or a new camera.

i went through basically the same thing last year. what helped me was just looking at what local real estate photographers (not drone, just ground) were charging and then thinking about the value i add on top of that. if a photographer charges $200-300 for an interior shoot why would drone be worth less? its more gear, more licensing, more liability. once i thought about it that way i stopped feeling weird about charging more.

also the clients who only care about price are the ones who will also be the most demanding about revisions and turnaround so honestly letting them go to the $80 thumbtack guy might be a gift lol