Why Your Real Estate Listing Description Isn't Getting Showings (And How to Fix It)

You did everything right. Great photos. Competitive price. Good neighborhood. And the showing requests are... underwhelming.

Before you cut the price, check the copy.

Listing descriptions are often the silent saboteur of homes that should be selling. They do their damage invisibly — buyers click through the photos, read two sentences, feel nothing, and close the tab. The photos brought them in. The copy sent them away.

Here are the seven most common reasons listing descriptions fail — and what to do about each one.

1. You Led With Features Instead of Feeling

The most common mistake in real estate copy is front-loading specs. "4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2,200 sqft with an open floor plan" is a perfectly accurate sentence that creates zero desire to see the house.

Features are what the house has. Benefits are what those features mean to the buyer. The description should sell the benefit.

Instead of: "Large primary suite with walk-in closet and en suite bath"

Try: "The primary suite is the kind of room that makes you forget about work the moment you close the door — spacious enough for a sitting area, with a walk-in closet that'll end the morning wardrobe chaos, and a spa bath with a soaking tub you'll actually use."

Same features. One of these creates desire. The other is furniture assembly instructions.

2. The Clichés Are Doing All the Work

Here's a quick self-diagnosis: search your last five listing descriptions for these words.

• Stunning
• Spacious
• Move-in ready
• Nestled
• Cozy
• Boasting
• Meticulously maintained
• Don't miss this one!

Every word on that list has been used in listings so many times that buyers' brains have learned to skip over them. They don't create emotion anymore — they signal "generic listing copy ahead."

The fix: every time you're about to write a cliché, stop and ask what specifically makes this true? If the kitchen is stunning, what about it is stunning? Write that instead.

3. You're Writing for Other Agents, Not Buyers

This one is subtle but pervasive. If you've been in real estate a while, you've absorbed industry language so deeply that you don't notice it anymore. Terms like "pride of ownership," "opportunity knocks," and "investor special" mean something specific to agents — but buyers read them differently or not at all.

Your listing description has exactly one job: make a buyer want to pick up the phone and schedule a showing. Every word should be evaluated against that standard.

Write for a person who works in marketing or engineering, not for a colleague at your brokerage. If they'd have to Google a phrase to understand it, rewrite it.

4. The First Sentence Is Wasted

Most people decide whether to keep reading in the first two seconds. On a mobile screen, you get about 100 characters before the "Read More" button appears.

What's in those 100 characters matters enormously.

"Welcome to this stunning 4-bedroom home" is 42 characters of cliché. By the time you get to what makes the house interesting, most buyers have already moved on.

Start with something that earns the read. A specific visual detail. A surprising fact. A relatable scene.

"This is the kitchen that made my buyers text their friends before the showing was even over."

That's a sentence that earns a "keep reading."

5. Everything Is Mentioned, Nothing Is Featured

When you try to mention every feature of a house, you end up featuring none of them. The 12th item on a list of features has the same visual weight as the first — which means the soaking tub and the single-car garage get equal billing.

Pick the two or three things that genuinely make this house stand out. Write specifically and emotionally about those. List everything else quickly in the property data fields where they belong.

Less is more. A description that makes one feature come alive will get you more showings than a description that mentions everything flatly.

6. There's No Call to Action (Or It's Weak)

"Don't miss this one!" is technically a call to action, but it's so overused that buyers don't process it as an instruction anymore.

Your listing description should end with a clear, specific invitation:

• "Showing this weekend — schedule through the listing or text [number]"
• "Open house Sunday 1–4, [address]. Come see why [neighborhood] buyers keep choosing this street"
• "Priced to move in the [neighborhood] market. Call me before someone else does."

Make it easy for a motivated buyer to take the next step right there in the description.

7. The Copy Doesn't Match the Photos

This one causes more confusion than most agents realize. Buyers are processing photos and text simultaneously. If your photos show a dark, moody, dramatically lit interior and your copy reads "bright and airy open floor plan," there's a cognitive dissonance that makes buyers trust neither.

Your copy and your photos should tell the same story. If the photos are twilight exteriors with moody amber light, lean into that in the copy. If the photos show a cheerful, sun-drenched kitchen, your copy should match that energy.

Great photos and weak copy is one of the most common reasons houses sit — and it's entirely fixable.

The Quick Fix: The Checklist

Before you publish your next listing, run it through these five questions:

1. Does the first sentence earn a "keep reading"?
2. Is there a cliché I can replace with something specific?
3. Am I featuring 2–3 things compellingly, or listing 12 things flatly?
4. Does this sound like something I'd actually say to a buyer in person?
5. Is there a clear next step for a motivated buyer?

If you can say yes to all five, your copy is working. If not, you know exactly where to focus your rewrites.

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PropWrite analyzes your listing photos and generates descriptions that actually create desire — MLS short, MLS long, and 13+ other formats. Try it free.