Zilow Zestimates Can Do More Damage To Your Home's Value Than Termites Ever Could
62Zillow IS Deciding Your Homes Value
Ever hear of Zillow? If you own a home they just emasculated you, or perhaps a more decent but less adequate term would be they undermined you.
If you haven’t heard of Zillow, you need to know that Zillow considers itself to be the Zmaster over the Zestimates of your home’s value. Naturally, buyers follow Zillow and shove the Zestimates of your home’s value in your face.
Existing home sales fell 0.8% in June putting 2011 on the track to beat 2010 as the worst in 13 years according to National Association of Realtors. It was the third monthly slide in a season when home sales are supposed to pick up. The Realtors group also reported an unexpected spike in buyers pulling out of contracts.
Zillow has Zestimates on nearly 100 million homes, and they can drop the value of your home with one of their wacky, unscientific Zestimates. Zillow claims their new Zestimates are 33% more accurate than their older ones. What happened to all the homeowners who labored under the older ones?
The disgusting part of Zillow’s business is they are a publicly traded company which means that traders hope to make money off of your decline in home value.
How can Zillow assess your home’s price without looking at it, and its nice features, and the pleasant neighborhood. Zillow says they have this magic formula that is an improved formula, but the new formula dropped the value of 100,000 homes recently.
Only in America could a guy with more money than integrity start a business based on valuing your home from a distance, and gain respect for his work. Your home is most likely price-controlled by Zillow; it doesn’t matter what your realtor thinks or what last month’s comps were, at least not enough to get you your price.
ryankett Level 4 Commenter 7 months ago
It can also work the other way, they can artificially deflate the market, and they can artificially inflate the market, and they could even manipulate different markets in different ways at different times. I saw a plot of land on eBay which had a Zillow estimate of $100000, next to that plot of land was a four bedroom home which was listed on realtor for $120000, the same plot size. By that logic, the home itself was only worth $20000. I can assure you that it would have cost me far more than $20000 to build a four bedroom home on that plot.
I agree wholeheartedly with your sentiments. Estimated values should only be based upon similar sales within X radius of your home within X amount of time. If you have a 3 bedroom 800 square ft home on 1 acre of land, and on the next street a 3 bedroom 800 square ft home on 1 acre of land happened to sell 3 months ago for $300k, then any estimate should value your home at $300k.
The only value that should be given to anything is the price that the market is willing to pay, trying to influence what the market is willing to pay before they pay it is a dangerous game to play.