Film Location FAQs

With more than 30 years combined experience of registering and booking locations, our team are well versed in the questions you're most likely to ask. From "what happens next" to how much can I earn", read on to find the answers to our frequently asked questions.

After we have accepted your location and our agreements have been signed, we will then make sure that we make your house easy to find on our website. We will tag your photographs highlighting the style of your property and its features. It is our job to make sure your property gets included in as many searches as possible. 

Once you've registered your property online, it will come through to our registrations team, and they will decide whether your location is right for us. Sadly, we can't accept every property, and we use our judgement to determine which locations to take, and which to turn down. We'll base that decision on several factors like how unique your property is or whether we already have houses like it in the same area. Ultimately we make a judgment on whether we think it is likely to attract work. Sometimes a location will look promising, but the quality of photographs is poor, or there just aren't enough of them to get a good impression of your property. In these circumstances we will ask you to provide some more photographs, possibly using a professional photographer before we add your location to our website.

Please don't be offended if we don't accept your property. Our decision is not whether we like your home; it is a commercial decision based on whether we are likely to find work for you. 

We can't give you a definite answer to how often you will be used. You may get a call in the first week, but then again, you may not hear from us for over a year.  Some locations never get used at all. It depends on whether you have the right property in the right area for what the client is looking for.

Our most popular locations offer something unique to the user, are in a good area (usually in or around London), are well-photographed and have flexible and accommodating owners. We always do our best to promote your location to our clients and try to match as many locations to suitable briefs as we can. 

"Our most popular locations offer something unique to the user, are in a good area (usually in or around London), are well-photographed and have flexible and accommodating owners."

The million dollar question - and the answer is....it all depends! Sadly, there is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question as there are so many variables which will influence how much a job will pay. It will depend on the production's budget, the level of disruption, the length of the shoot and the type of property you have. Stately homes generally command higher fees than suburban semi's. As a rule of thumb, feature films tend to have the highest budgets, followed closely by TV dramas. At the same time, editorial or stills lifestyle shoots with small crews, and little disruption usually pay much less. To give you some idea, we frequently negotiate location fees of a few hundred pounds for a photographic shoot, between £1,000 and £2,000 for a TV commercial and upward of £10,000 for a week's filming.

Although we don't publish a rate-card, our team of location coordinators are very experienced and will know the going rates for different types of job. They will do their best to get you the best price they can. And remember, we never confirm a booking without getting your agreement on fees beforehand. 

Some productions can be extremely demanding and can bombard you with requests that you don't feel comfortable with. If you know in advance that you want to set some limits on what a client can do in your location, then it is best to talk to your agency about it when you register so that they can note it in your file. Some owners don't allow decorating or don't want their furniture moved. Others don't want filming in certain rooms or don't want any filming at night. It's much better to be open about what you will and won't agree to from the start than to change your mind at the last minute.

When it comes to negotiating what a production can and cannot do on the day, it is our job to make sure that you know what they want to do and everything is agreed in the contract before any filming takes place. You certainly don't have to agree to anything you don't want to. However, the more accommodating you can be, the more likely they are to choose your location and to come back in the future. 

Our website is your shop window, so the best thing you can do to make your location stand out is to make sure you send us the very best images you can. It means photographing every room from multiple angles and in good light, making sure that you include some establishing shots of the outside as well as shots of the garden. Take a look at chapter 5 for some tips on how to photograph your house correctly. If you think you can't do your location justice, consider getting some professional photographs done.

Finally, tidy up! You'd be amazed at the number of people who send in photos of unmade beds and clutter everywhere, and then wonder why they don't get any work.

"Our website is your shop window, so make sure you send us the very best images you can."

In most cases, you will not need to seek permission to use your house for filming, but there are some exceptions to this:

1. You don't own the property. If you are renting, then you need to ask the owner's permission to use the house as a location. We have several homes on our books which are rented. Usually, the owners and the tenants split the location fee so that both parties benefit.

2. You live in an apartment block. You may find that your lease or management company doesn't allow filming, or has restrictions to protect the other residents. You can often overcome these restrictions if you (or the production company) compensates the other residents for their inconvenience. We ask you to check if your building allows filming as the involvement of a management company can add another layer of charges on top of the location fee.

3. Planning. Some councils have a limit on how many days of filming you can have before you need to get planning permission. It doesn't usually affect many locations, but if you are popular and repeatedly used, or you get bookings for long-term hires, then it might be worth checking out your local authority's website. 

We recommend being as open and honest with your neighbours as possible as disgruntled neighbours can make life difficult for both you and the shoot. Most location managers will letter-drop your neighbours before filming takes place. The letter lets them know what is going on and gives them a contact number to call if there are any problems. Sometimes neighbours are even asked to get involved, perhaps being asked for the use of their driveway for additional parking (and earning a small fee for their trouble).

If you are a popular location house and have filming or photographic shoots several times a month, then we would recommend talking to your immediate neighbours. If valuable parking spaces in your road are continually being taken over by film and photography crews, then neighbours may well lose patience. Excellent communication is the key to keeping everyone happy.

"When it comes to neighbours, excellent communication is the key to keeping everyone happy."

There is no denying that filming can be disruptive. If you have neighbours who might be affected by what is happening in your property, it pays to keep them informed and onside. 

Most photoshoots and small film productions won't need you to move out (although you may need to make plans for the day, especially if you have children). However, some big feature films and TV dramas where filming lasts over several days may require you to go and stay in a hotel for a few nights. Your costs (including food) will be paid for by the production. It doesn't mean you can go ahead and book the Ritz, but usually, the costs of a reasonably priced local hotel will be covered. 

Answer: anything! The most important thing to expect is an early start and potentially, a late finish. If a production can squeeze everything they can into a one day shoot then they will do that, rather than go to the expense of hiring a location for a second day. Other than that, it will entirely depend on the nature of the shoot. Small shoots can feel very relaxed whereas large productions can, at times, feel overwhelming. Expect lots of questions about where things are and how things work, but once you've shown the crew around, you should be able to leave them to it. If we've done our job properly, you will know exactly what to expect, and will have agreed to everything in advance. 

"If we've done our job properly, you will know exactly what to expect, and will have agreed to everything in advance."