September 6, 2026 · 10 min read

AI listing video disclosure: what the rules actually say, state by state and MLS by MLS

California's AB 723, Wisconsin's Act 69, New York's warning and two MLS policies, read from the source: what an AI-enhanced listing video must disclose.

An agent posts a 60-second listing video made from the listing photos. The camera glides into the kitchen, pushes toward the fireplace, pulls back from the pool. No drone flew and nobody walked the house with a gimbal. Does that need a label, and whose rule says so?

The honest answer in September 2026 is that it depends on the state and the MLS, and that most of what is written about it online is vendor copy quoting other vendor copy. So this post goes to the texts: the California statute, the Wisconsin act, the New York regulator's alert, two published MLS policies, and the one study of real listing photos done at scale. Where a rule could not be traced to a primary source, it says so.

This is general information, not legal advice. MLS and board rules differ and change; check your own board's current policy and ask a lawyer about your own situation.

The one line every rule draws

Read together, the sources agree on one distinction. On one side: cropping, exposure, colour correction, sharpening. Nobody requires disclosure for these. On the other: adding, removing or changing something about the property, its condition, or its surroundings. That side needs a disclosure everywhere a rule exists, and parts of it are prohibited outright.

Video sits across that line in a way photos do not. A video can leave every pixel of the house untouched and still imply something false about how it was captured: that a drone flew, that a person walked room to room, that a view continued past the edge of the frame.

California: AB 723, in force since January 2026

California has an actual statute on the books. Assembly Bill 723, chaptered on October 10, 2025, adds Section 10140.8 to the Business and Professions Code. The requirement, paraphrased from the bill text: when a broker, salesperson, or someone acting on their behalf uses a digitally altered image in advertising or promotional material for a property, they must include a disclosure that the image was altered, and provide access to the unaltered original, by link, URL or QR code. The disclosure must be "reasonably conspicuous and located on or adjacent to the image."

The definition is the part worth reading twice. A "digitally altered image" is one changed "through the use of photo editing software or artificial intelligence to add, remove, or change elements," and the bill lists examples: fixtures, furniture, landscaping, paint colour, views, neighbouring properties. Routine adjustments to lighting, cropping, colour and exposure are excluded.

The text names no dollar penalty; the legislative digest notes that violating the Real Estate Law is already a crime, which is why trade press calls non-disclosure a misdemeanour. And it says "image," not "video." Whether a video generated from a still is a "digitally altered image" of that still is left to a reasonable reading, and a frame that shows more room, or a different angle, than the photo did has had elements added. Treat it as covered.

HousingWire's reporting puts the effective date at January 1, 2026, consistent with the normal rule for a 2025 chaptered bill.

Wisconsin: 2025 Act 69, effective January 2027

Wisconsin is the first state whose text plainly reaches beyond photographs. 2025 Wisconsin Act 69, enacted December 9, 2025 and effective January 1, 2027, creates section 452.136(1m), which requires a licensee to "disclose if the advertising has been altered or modified using technology, including artificial intelligence, to add, remove, or change elements of the property that creates a false or misleading impression."

Note the extra clause. California asks whether elements were changed. Wisconsin asks whether the change "creates a false or misleading impression," which turns on the buyer's impression, not the agent's intent. A gliding camera that makes a buyer believe there is drone footage is exactly the impression the clause is written for. The act prescribes no wording.

New York: a regulator's warning, not yet a statute

New York has no AI-specific statute in force. It has an existing advertising rule and a Department of State that has said, in writing, that it applies. On November 13, 2025 the Department issued an alert about AI-generated listing images. Secretary of State Walter T. Mosley's quote: "While A.I. can help homebuyers imagine what a potential home can look like, these automated technology tools may produce misleading or exaggerated representation of properties."

The rule the alert points to is 19 NYCRR § 175.25(c)(9), which requires that property advertisements honestly and accurately depict the property. The consequences it names are licensing discipline under Real Property Law § 441-c and the state's general deceptive-advertising provisions, General Business Law §§ 349, 350 and 350-a.

Several vendor blogs describe "January 2026 New York guidance" with a "$1,000 per violation" penalty. I could not find that guidance or that figure in any Department of State publication, and the alert above is dated November 2025 and names no dollar amount. Treat the $1,000 figure as unverified. A pending bill, S9584, would define "digital representations" to include video and immersive media; as of this writing it is a bill, not a law.

Texas: a general rule, and a specific one we could not find

Texas's advertising rule, 22 TAC § 535.155, prohibits any advertisement that "misleads or is likely to deceive the public" or is "inaccurate in any material fact or representation." That covers a misleading AI video and has for years.

Several vendor posts add that Texas adopted a rule in February 2026 requiring AI-generated images to be tagged in the MLS and labelled in syndication. I searched the Texas Real Estate Commission's rules and advertising guidance and could not find it. Until someone links the text, do not rely on it in either direction.

What the MLSs say: two published policies

State law is one layer. The MLS is another, and its rules are enforced fastest, because the MLS can pull a photo.

NorthstarMLS (Minnesota and western Wisconsin) published guidelines on virtual staging and AI-enhanced listing photos dated July 10, 2026. Any photo that is virtually staged, AI-generated or AI-enhanced "should be identified as such," either "directly in the photo caption or filename visible in the listing viewer" or "on the altered photo." For each staged or enhanced area the listing must carry "at least one unaltered 'Before' image." And there is a hard ban: "Images generated wholly or in part by AI or editing that depict permanent features, structural changes, or improvements that do not actually exist are prohibited." Cropping and colour correction are fine if they do not materially alter permanent elements.

Bright MLS (the mid-Atlantic) has a Policy on Images and Documents in the MLS dated February 28, 2024. Section E: "Virtually-staged photo(s)/rendering(s) must be disclosed in the MLS." Editing a photo "to include visual elements not within a property owner's control is strictly prohibited," with the example of "editing in a view of a scene that is not physically possible from the specified location." Removing such elements is equally prohibited: "removing power lines, water towers, or nearby highways." Adding furniture, mirrors, artwork and plants to an empty room is permitted.

Note what the Bright policy does not say. Many vendor guides state that Bright requires "VIRTUALLY STAGED" burned onto the image. The February 2024 text requires disclosure "in the MLS" and specifies no placement or wording. An on-image label is the safest way to satisfy any of these rules, but the burned-in-caps requirement is not in the publicly linked policy.

The pattern across both: disclose in the caption or on the image, keep the original available, never fabricate what the property has or hide what surrounds it.

How big the problem actually is

There is one study of real listings at scale. In June 2026 HousingWire reported a Coraly analysis of just under 40,000 primary listing images on Zillow, Redfin, Realtor.com and Homes.com from the first quarter of 2026: 10.8% showed indicators of digital manipulation, and more than 90% of those carried no visible disclosure on the image, in the caption, or in the listing text. Sky replacement was 69% of the altered images; virtual staging 10%; object removal 1.5%. The researchers also flagged 218 images that appeared to be CGI renders presented as photographs.

The report examined primary photos only, and its detectors are heuristics, not admissions. But the shape of the finding is the useful part: the most common edit (a swapped sky) is the one most people consider harmless, and the gap is, in the study's words, "not a will problem, but a workflow problem." The originals stay on the photographer's drive, so the agent asked for the unaltered image, as AB 723 requires, often cannot produce it. For a video generated from the photos, the photos are the originals and are already in the listing. Keeping them there, unaltered, is most of the compliance work.

The test for video specifically

The clearest published framework for AI video specifically is a June 30, 2026 HousingWire column by Paul Parker, When AI listing videos look too real, which proposes five questions before publishing. The two that matter most for a photo-to-video tour:

First, did the technology add, remove or materially change anything about the property? A camera move that stays inside the photographed room changes nothing about the house. A camera move that "reveals" a wall, a window or a doorway the photo did not show has invented it, and that is an alteration under every text above.

Second, does the video present movement or perspective that was never actually captured? Parker's suggested disclosure for this case is direct: "AI-generated video created from property photographs. No drone or walkthrough footage was captured." The point is not that motion is dishonest. It is that a buyer who believes they are watching footage has been told something false about the source, even when every frame is true to the house.

That is the difference between the two kinds of AI listing video on the market. One animates real photos and can be labelled truthfully in one sentence. The other generates rooms, flights and views, and no label makes it accurate. Pic2VidTour is built on the first rule: every scene is animated from one real photo, the camera never travels toward space no photo documents, and an "AI-enhanced video" caption ships on by default. The rule is the point, not the product.

Does video even matter enough to bother

The best data on what buyers' agents value comes from NAR's 2025 Profile of Home Staging, released May 6, 2025. Buyers' agents said that including photos (73%), traditional staging (57%), videos (48%) and virtual tours (43%) in a listing was highly important to their clients. Methodology: 1,266 usable responses from a February 2025 survey of 49,806 active Realtors, margin of error plus or minus 2.75%.

That is agents reporting on their clients, not buyer behaviour, and it says nothing about days on market or price. Figures that do claim that, "403% more inquiries" being the most repeated, trace back to no study anyone can produce, so none appears here.

What to do next

1. Find your MLS's current image policy and read the section on virtual staging or altered images. Search the MLS site for "virtual staging," not "AI"; most policies still use the older term.
2. If the property is in California, put a disclosure on or next to every altered image and video, and keep a link to the unaltered photos live for as long as the listing is advertised.
3. Label any AI-generated or AI-enhanced video as such in the caption everywhere it is posted, in wording a buyer understands: "AI-enhanced video made from the listing photographs; no drone or walkthrough footage was filmed."
4. Keep the original photos in the listing gallery, unaltered. They are your "Before" images and your proof of source.
5. Refuse any tool or edit that adds, removes or changes a permanent feature, a view, or a neighbouring element. NorthstarMLS and Bright ban it outright.
6. Re-check this in January. Wisconsin's act takes effect in 2027, New York's bill is pending, and MLS policies here get revised often.