“This marketing for homes and agents is free, so it’s no surprise that as of this writing we have more than 7,700 of them and growing”

–Rich Barton, December 12, 2006

hmm.. marketing… sure sounds like advertising to me, David.

Barton also says 70% of “for sale postings” come from agents and 30% come from owners– gee, it sure seems like somebody over there knows this stat. Funny that you guys in the trenches don’t have access to it

http://tinyurl.com/5zyjg5

With enough litigants, Zillow will be dead.

Coffee shop talk and gossip drove down the value of Bear Sterns in a matter of weeks, so what could Zillow do to your home, neighborhood, housing development or city. Municipalities, homeowner associations and developers should be consulting with their trusted legal councils, right now, with a sharp eye on liability and damages.

Could Zillow be damaging our USA real estate market? As the Fed looks for sacpegoats…. it’s open hunting season!

I always found it curious that Rich Barton would make that coffee shop gossip analogy (as if anyone wants gossip about them permanently on the web), but then again, he made the analogy of Zillow to the Kelley Blue Book (remember that?), when cars are more or less standardized commodities (ever see a car with a solarium?) and homes are as personal and unique as people, in most cases.

Interestingly, Zillow dropped the Kelley Blue Book analogy (to their credit, I might add) which acknowledged, I think, the validity of the argument that homes are not commodities subject to valuation like cars, especially when valuation (zestimates) are posted without a visit to the home.

On one hand, it’s admirable to aspire to transparency, but you’d better be prepared for the consequences when what is made transparent is ugly, false or, even worse, malicious and open to litigation. Privacy issues are in many ways more imortant than the zeal for transparency.

Web 2.0 needs to be careful not to be blinded by a popular buzz word like “transparency” without thinking what it’s full ramifications can mean.

I might think it’s a good idea to make my neighbor’s amorous activities transparent by posting it all on my blog, but upon second thought, I think I’ll refrain.

There is indeed a risk in increasing your property taxes by increasing your home value on Zillow. And consider what excuse you’ll have when the assessor says “Hey, Mr. Owner, you input the data to increase the value, not us.”

I believe Zillow’s Rich Barton did not update and increase his home’s zestimate until just before he put it up for sale.

By: Robert Lawrence

Great detective work on this. I wonder what would happen if more homeowners knew what Zillow was doing? I would never have known about this without your article, again thank you for this.
Warm Regards,
Rob
http://www.battlecall.com

Zillow wants homes listed for sale and has decided that, if the homeowner, or agent, doesn’t do it, we’ll let some other professional do it and reward them by letting them put their contact info on the house– for why else is the contact info necessary.