Questions, answered straight

Can I use AI renders commercially?

On any paid Archome plan, yes — every image you generate carries a full commercial licence, including client work, marketing and sales material. The free plan is licensed for personal use only.

How many free renders do I get?

A new account gets 100 credits and three free renders. No card required, and it is a one-time allowance rather than a monthly one.

What happens to my credits if I cancel?

You keep the credits you already paid for. Monthly plan credits stay usable until the end of the period you paid for, and one-time pack credits stay on the account after cancellation.

How much does an AI render cost?

Most renders cost 10 credits. On the $29 plan that is 1,000 credits a month, so roughly 100 standard renders or 33 at the highest quality setting.

Is there a free trial without a credit card?

Yes. You sign up with an email or a Google account and get 100 credits — no card at any point, and no countdown to a charge. It is a one-time allowance rather than a recurring one.

How much does virtual staging cost?

Human virtual-staging services typically charge per photo, commonly in the $20-40 range each. AI staging works out far cheaper: on Archome a one-time $15 credit pack covers a full listing set of roughly 16 top-quality images.

What should I charge agents for virtually staged photos?

Market rates photographers report are $25-$50 per staged photo, and $40-$80 when furniture removal is involved. Your production cost on Archome is about $0.87 per Ultra image on the $29 plan.

Can I deliver the staged images as my own work, with no Archome branding?

Yes. Paid plans produce clean files with no watermark and no branding of any kind, and the commercial licence lets you deliver and invoice them as part of your service.

Can I use the images on Zillow, Realtor.com and my brokerage site?

Yes, on any paid plan — the commercial licence covers MLS, portals, brokerage sites, brochures, social and paid ads. The free trial is personal evaluation only and does not carry it.

Do you lock me into an annual contract?

No. Plans are month-to-month by default and cancel from your own settings. An annual option exists and is discounted, but you are never enrolled in it automatically and nothing renews annually unless you chose annual.

Does AI rendering keep my actual design?

Yes — that is the core difference from a general image AI. Room positions, wall lines, proportions and camera angle are preserved; the AI adds materials, furniture, light and context on top of your geometry.

How long does an AI render take?

About 30 seconds for a standard render. There is no scene setup, no material assignment and no render queue — you upload, describe the look you want, and the image comes back.

Can AI render a hand-drawn sketch?

Yes. A photo of a pencil sketch on paper works, as long as the line work is legible. Clean lines and clear edges produce the most faithful result.

Do I have to disclose virtual staging on a listing?

In most US markets, yes — MLS rules and general advertising-honesty standards both point the same way. Label staged images ("virtually staged") and keep the unstaged originals available.

Can AI show a client their remodel before and after?

Yes — from one photo of the room as it stands. The after keeps the real geometry (walls, windows, camera) and changes the finishes you are quoting, so the pair is genuinely the same room.

Is AI staging better than outsourcing to an editing service?

It is faster and far cheaper per image; a human editor still wins on unusual rooms and on art direction. Many photographers use both — AI for the volume, a human for the two or three hero shots.

How do I stage empty listing photos with AI?

Upload the vacant room photo, choose a furniture style, and a furnished version of that exact room comes back in about 30 seconds. The room's walls, windows and camera angle stay exactly as shot.

Can I empty an occupied room and then stage it?

Yes — removing the current furniture and restaging are two steps, both on the same credit balance. Mark what should go, then furnish the cleared room in the style you want.

Can I show a dated kitchen renovated for a fixer-upper listing?

Yes — the same room with new cabinets, counters, flooring and light, in the original layout and camera angle. Label it clearly as a renovation concept, never as the current condition.

Can I show a client what a remodel will look like before I quote it?

Yes — photograph the room as it is today and produce the same room in the finishes you are proposing. It is the fastest way to settle a material decision before it becomes a change order.

I am a landlord — can I stage a rental listing or an empty unit?

Yes, and it is the same job as a sale listing: furnish the empty unit so a tenant can picture living in it. On a paid plan the commercial licence covers rental portals and your own listing pages.

Can AI generate a floor plan layout for me?

Not with Archome. It renders a plan you already have; it does not design a layout from a description, size rooms or resolve circulation. Those are design decisions and the tool deliberately stays out of them.

Can AI rendering replace V-Ray or Corona?

No, and it is not trying to. AI covers the concept and option stages where speed matters more than physical accuracy; a rendering engine remains the right tool when the image itself is the deliverable.

Does it do CAD drafting or BIM?

No. Archome produces images, not drawings or models. It does not draft, does not author BIM data and does not export DWG or RVT files.

Will AI staging get my listing flagged by the MLS?

Not if the image stays truthful and you label it. What gets agents penalised is altering the property itself — adding a fireplace, moving a window, inventing a finished basement. Some boards fine per photo for that; agents have reported penalties in the hundreds of dollars per image.

Does the AI move walls, windows or doors?

No. Wall positions, window and door count and position, ceiling height and camera framing are locked to the input photo. Only finishes, furniture, greenery and light change.

What file formats can I upload?

JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF and AVIF, up to 25 MB. iPhone HEIC photos are converted automatically. PDF is not supported — screenshot or export the page as an image first.

Do I need a powerful computer or a GPU?

No. Everything runs on our servers and the result comes back to your browser. A laptop, a Mac or an older office machine works exactly the same as a workstation.

Can I render directly from SketchUp or Revit?

From SketchUp and 3ds Max there are free plugins that send the active viewport straight through. Revit, Rhino, ArchiCAD and AutoCAD work through a screenshot or an exported view — no plugin needed.

Can I print an AI render on a presentation board?

Yes, if you upscale first. A standard render suits screen and small print; run it through the 4K upscale before sending anything A1 or larger to a printer.

Can I stage a whole listing — 10 to 20 photos — in one sitting?

Yes. Each image is handled individually and comes back in about 30 seconds, so a twenty-photo listing is a single working session. On the $29 plan a ten-photo set costs roughly $9 in credits.

What if the result comes back wrong?

Run it again with a clearer style direction — each attempt is a fresh render of the same photo and costs credits, not a support ticket or another day of turnaround.

Can my whole office use one account?

Every plan is one account, and no plan has per-seat logins. A small office can work from one account; if several people need to draw from a shared team credit balance, that is arranged on request on the Enterprise plan.

Is there an API for rendering?

Yes. A single REST endpoint takes an image and a prompt and returns a render in about 30 seconds, authenticated with a bearer token and billed from the same credit balance.

Is AI rendering worth it for a small practice?

It depends on how many images you currently skip. If you outsource a few renders a year the saving is modest; if you regularly go without images because they are too slow or expensive, that is where it pays.

I am a real estate photographer — can I resell AI staging to my agents?

Yes. Every paid Archome plan carries a commercial licence, so you can bill your agents for the staged images. Production cost is roughly $0.87 per Ultra image on the $29 plan; photographers commonly bill agents $25-$50 per staged photo.