I had a quiet coffee with a Sydney listing agent last week and she said something that stuck. “Every listing video looks the same now. Drone shot, kitchen pan, lifestyle shot of the beach. Buyers scroll past it.” She is not wrong.

VPA spend in 2026 sits at similar levels to 2024, but the creative output has flattened. The same templated motion videos, the same colour-graded stills, the same agent walk-throughs that all blur together on REA and Domain. Buyers in our market have been seeing the same look for three years and they have stopped paying attention to it.

What the agents I rate are doing instead

The best agents in inner Sydney have started pulling the production back to something that looks human. A photographer instead of a videographer for some campaigns. Stills with grain rather than overcooked HDR. Listing copy that talks about the road noise, the school zone, the actual reasons people might or might not buy this house.

It feels counterintuitive. Spend the VPA on less polished media. But the engagement data agents are sharing privately tells the story. Honest creative is getting more saves and inspections than the templated stuff.

The video that still works

There is an exception. Owner-occupier video — the vendor talking on camera about the home they raised their kids in — is doing well. It is hard to fake. It does not look like the rest of the market. Agents I rate are pitching this to vendors as part of the campaign now.

It is not for every listing. Investment sales and deceased estates will keep the standard treatment. But owner-occupier campaigns in 2026 are differentiating on authenticity, not gloss.

What this means for buyer behaviour

The buyers I have spoken to this autumn are doing more pre-inspection research than ever — checking the strata, the planning portal, the comparable sales — and they are spending less time on the listing creative itself. If the campaign cannot tell them something the data cannot, it does not register.

VPA is not dead. But the way it is spent in 2026 needs to change. Less drone, more truth.