When they first rolled out the improve-it-yourself feature, it turned out to be no more than an opportunity to list your upgrades – because little or no value was added to your zestimate. I received this by email today:
Hi Jim,
Today Zillow announced enhancements to the Zestimate® home value that allow homeowners to edit their home facts on Zillow and, depending on the new information they provide, potentially see an immediate impact on their Zestimate. For instance, if the square footage of a home is out of date on Zillow, the homeowner can correct this information and see an adjustment in their Zestimate.
Can listing agents use this feature to affect the Zestimate?
We encourage you to work with your seller prior to placing the home on the market to ensure all information on Zillow is accurate. If your seller is concerned about the Zestimate, check the home facts and make updates where needed. We suggest you communicate that the Zestimate is an estimate, not an appraisal.
We continue to iterate on our existing offerings to improve how buyers, sellers and homeowners use the resources available on Zillow. Should you have any questions about the Zestimate, visit www.zillow.com/zestimate.
Sincerely,
Greg Schwartz, Chief Revenue Officer, Zillow Group
I’ll believe it when I see it! In the end, the zestimates will likely be more inaccurate as sellers fluff their values to the moon. But Zillow is learning the ways of the industry, and is now siding with the sellers. Get Good Help!
Not buying it – my house value isn’t wrong because the data is wrong (data on tract houses from 15 years ago is not wrong) but because the model is confused. And I can’t find a button that says “hey, Zillow, please have a human engineer investigate why my house data is 100% correct but the value the algorithm spits out is completely wrong.” That’s the button they need to add!
Pay me and I might consider it. The idea of upgrading their database for free is an asymmetrical bargain. Maybe I’m just bitter because they value my primary residence at the lot value.
I tuned up all my houses on Zillow a long time ago. The z-value on them are generally higher than most of the neighbors; especially when you make sq ft and condition adjustments. Cause and effect? No idea. I do think Godzillow on balance is looking to spike the market; what incentive to they have to keep prices down?
Zillow has 2 separate listings for my house. One is 4 bedroom and the other is a 5 bedroom. Theres a 50k swing between both zestimates. Just had my house professionally appraised and the value came in 100k under the zestimate.
Net/Net I don’t put much faith in Zillow.
My zestimate isn’t even close to what I would list it for. It’s all in the recent “sold” comps.
My home has been rebuilt in another subdivision a couple miles away. I’ve seen the photos and my agent has been inside that one on a recent realtor caravan. The finish detail and use of materials inside the home, its location by a very busy road and a basic landscaping package are vastly different than mine bought four years ago. The main difference is I bought at the bottom of the market here and builders put in a lot of extras to entice buyers. Now they don’t need to and have scaled back what they offer. Also, prices have rebounded from market lows.
I don’t understand why people assume a “zestimate” is close to an appraisal price. Except for the “z”, the word is “estimate”. There is nothing like actually walking through a home to get a clear indication of its value.
No wonder JtR’s “on the street” videos provide such value to prospective buyers in the NSDC area…
Only a professional appraisal would give you the right ball park for the value of your house. Zillow’s estimates are based on sqft and comparable sales. It has no way to account for any renovation or improvement you do inside the house. You can put 100k on a kitchen and another 100k on the bathrooms, how is Zillow or anyone else going to know about it?
Look, we all agree that “Z” estimates are completely wrong and worthless. BUT, like it or not, they are out there and need to be affirmatively dealt with one way or the other. If you aren’t selling, shouldn’t you do everything in your power to make sure your “z” estimate is as high as possible so as to help other sellers in your neighborhood? Sooner or later, they will be your comps.
This seems like a system guaranteed to encourage fraud. How many sellers and brokers are going to juice their Zillow numbers pre-sale?
Who will challenge them? Zillow certainly isn’t going to do an audit. Buyers will assume any wrong Zillow info is just par for the Zillow course (if they’re fortunate enough to discover any false info in time).
It is the way the system – and the industry – has always worked.
Sellers and agents are allowed to pull any trick in the book to deceive buyers about value.
Think about what you see in the listings. Agents exaggerate the facts, use deceptive photos (like views that are super-zoomed), constantly ‘refresh’ listings, and omit key items, etc. and then put ‘buyer to verify all’ and get away with it.
The C.A.R. attorney said the 10 pages of our contract are devised to protect realtors from getting sued by buyers.
Buyers are CRAZY not to get good help!
Another item never disclosed to buyers – how much commission their agent makes:
http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-harney-20150301-story.html
I guess theres nothing new in what Zillow is allowing. It’s just making fraud and distortion easier while seeming more benign, anonymous and consequence-free.
An Internet specialty.
Indeed.