Thread: How Good Are Zillow Estimates

Here's an article from Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/...DQxMjQwWj.html


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http://www.metcapitalgroup.com
Commercial Direct Lender

Zillow is gracing the cover of this weeks Fortune Magazine:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortu...ion=2007020810

For a snapshot, I think zillow is okay. I have seen some of the zillow estimates that were way off the mark, so be careful.

Not so accurate. Problem is the time it takes for the property appraiser to update their records and then Zillow to update the database could be months.

As YourOrlando said, good for a quick snapshow, but don't rely on it.

Buyers and Seller like to use it to their advantage. You will see seller say ther home is worth $xxxxxxx but the true market is lower. You may loose the listing because of your honest and true approach to the process. People don't like to hear they are wrong even if they base their opinion on speculative information.

Beware...

My own personal house is off by about 30% in actual value - that means it is a waste of time. I have tried it on a few other houses and seen it be off just as much. The problem is that the information source itself is notoriously bad. The gurus over at zillow know this too.

Junk. If anybody wants to buy my house for what they say its worth, I'll meet you at the bank.

Their information is good for initial data to calculate the value of property. However, one has to examine all the particular parameters of a property that are not considered by the zillow methodology. In sum, it is a good start but could be misleading if in the wrong hands.

My 2 cents,

James

There has been a complaint filed with the FTC by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition for inaccurate value estimates produced by Zillow. I usually print out the Zillow estimate for properties when I go on a CMA - many sellers are checking this out and it's good to have that resource as a counter to them saying their homes is worth $X. I'm thinking of putting a mini-powerpoint together with all of the mistakes in my local market that Zillow has made. One CMA I went on the other week, Zillow said the home was worth almost 1/3 more than it was actually worth. Thankfully, the homeowners had no clue who Zillow was but appreciated the fact that I showed them all the available data.

It goes to show that real estate, like other fields, required a sophisticated data analytic approach. With all of the myriad factors involved in property valuation it is clear that a single compter based algorithm is not sufficient by itself.

Thanks,

James

I'd agree with everyone here. Its OKAY for a snapshot but they can be off and I wouldn't rely on the value. I can get a better idea just by pulling a list kit rather than using Zillow. I never even run a house on zillow...