I'm off to Zillow to find out!  Doesn't sound good.

Yes I have also seen some crazy stuf pop up on my zillow accounts. I wonder what it is????

Jeff, I have had this issue and continue to have this issue. Not only with Zillow but with most of the sites where my listings are automatically syndicated. There are so many sites that have my listings on them I have quit worrying about how they are displayed. The cat is already out of the bag and is too far gone to catch.

Jeff - they always mess up DOM, but what drives me nuts is their Zestimate..waaay off in most cases.

Jeff~ I'm starting to wonder if its not just Zillow, but quite a few of the sites we syndicate to. So may times listings are found, are not found or with inaccurate info. What gives...wish I knew. Bottom line, its no wonder that consumers don't know who to trust at times...a human REALTOR or a computer website..?

Diane - well I suspect it is similar to what we will find on other sites too. :)

Jeff

Laura - well it is disappointing, to say the least, but perhaps not all that unexpected. They are not working for US, after all.

Jeff

BB - yep, you are right, as always. It is not worth getting upset about. It is the reality of web advertising in the real estate world. It makes sense to focus on what we can control adn not worry about the rest. Too bad the consumers are getting duped.

Jeff

Linda - so true. I think, from conversations I have had, that many consumers actually realize how wrong the estimates are, adn they do not rely onthem. But I have had offers based on them, as well as sellers who wanted to list based on them. Not a good idea, in some cases.

Jeff

Laura M - excellent point. I suspect it is many sites. I just mentioned Zillow because they are leaders in terms of traffic, but I'm sure many others are behaving similarly, or worse. We need to make sure we educate our sellers so they understand how it all works...or doesn't, and help set expectations. Thank you for your thoughts.

Jeff

Jeff-

Hey, it's Drew from Zillow. My apologies for your trouble with the site and for your difficulty getting help resolving these issues. I found your zillow profile and will try to address all the issues you mentioned.

The issue with your multi-family listings is a matching issue on our end that is resulting in us re-creating properties. Is the correct 4034 ingraham st listing the one with #36 after it, or is the correct address 4034 ingraham st with no unit number? Once I have that answer, I'll have our tech team look into this, and also remove the two incorrect properties from Zillow.

You newest listing is showing as 56 days on zillow (not the same as days on market) because the owner had previously posted the property for sale in January prior to listing with you. Our system does not reset the days on zillow every time the listing is marked for sale or not for sale so as to avoid easy gaming to make listings appear as new listings. I'll pass on the feedback about the use case of a FSBO property moving to a for sale by agent listing, but I can't promise we'll change our days on zillow logic to accomodate this use case. Adding another field for "days on market" is also something we have thought about, but not yet made a decision on.

I just removed your listing that sold a couple months ago - to get around the sold issue, I updated the status and said "no longer for sale". As for the reason it got re-posted, it looks like one of our partners sending a XML feed to zillow had your listing in the feed -- I'll look into which specific feed and get back to you.

Regarding your listings not showing up in our search, please let me know the exact search filters you used so I can try to reproduce the issue.

You can reach me via the contact me button on my active rain profile.

I hope this helps.

I am glad to see Drew taking an active role in getting it resolved.  One of the huge concerns I have with listings is accurate information.  I am always concerned about inaccurate information being posted on the internet.

Drew - thank you for a response to the issues I raised. I left a post on a thread on the issue of duplicate listings on Zillow itself. Seems I am not the only one with this problem. Appreciate the follow-up and I will email you privately.

Jeff

Randy - as others have said there are a number of sites with issues regarding how things are listed and their accuracy. I, too, am  happy to have some sort of response and a willingness to address the issue.

Jeff

Give non-brokers access to the MLS's IDX data; problem solved.

The only reason Zillow and other non-broker web sites struggle with accuracy is because they are forced to rely on a hodge-podge of 3rd-party sources for their listing data.  If they could retrieve this data directly from the MLS's IDX it would always be up-to-date & accurate.  You, as an agent, would be in full control.

Gabe  - I get that. The bigger issue I have is inaccurate information when I have directly submitted the ad myself and problems result.

Jeff

Jeff, great information. Third party sources and sites like Zillow scare me. It's like letting a new realtor put information about your listings on their sites. They don't always have the up to date information and they don't know the product.

Good for Zillow to have someone on staff like Drew to chase down problems like this. Rudy at Trulia is also doing a great job.

Both sites have some issues, but I wish more large brokerages had social media gurus out there trying to solve the problems of the masses.  (Windermere are you listening???)

Some of the Zillow "Zestimates" are totally off the chart.

Does anyone else find this to be so?

this reall worries us.  we are about to catalog our listings on Zillow as well.

Thanks for the heads up.

I had one of my previous clients call and ask why their listing was still on the market with Zillow.  I went in and saw that they still had my name associated with the property yet when I looked in my account nothing showed up.  For the life of me I couldn't figure out how to get it out and the seller was unhappy.  Time will continue to work out the kinks.

Cindy-

Without having seen the home on Zillow, I can say the most common cause of your issue is that the listings are still being advertised for sale on other websites (such as Threewide, z57, Homes and Land, etc) that send us listings via an XML feed. You can click the "listing website" link next to the for sale price on the home details page to see where the property is being advertised. Unless agents remove their listings from sites that are syndicating listings to Zillow, they will continue to be marked as for sale on Zillow.

If you post the address here, I can look into this.

Jeff:

Great post.  I see Lola has been inspiring this week (as usual)! 

I agree with BB...the cat is out of the bag and already ran off way too far.  I never want to go back to the days of being viewed as "Gate keepers" for all the information but I do wish standards could be enforced.  I get calls where people found "my new listing" on such and such site...I sold it 2 years ago!  They get ticked at me for advertising it.  I had no clue! 

As a listing agent, I wish that I did have a clue and a voice in where my listings go.

You've got to hand it to those Zillow folks, they answer support issues...quickly.  It seems they are 100% serious about improving their products and services. They have really warmed on me.

Gabes comment of giving IDX data to everyone just cracks me up.  I think many people have forgotten that IDX was created so that MLS participants/subscribers could display the listings of other participant/subscribers who wished to voluntarily participate.  It was not to create free content for 3rd party sites like Zillow so they can earn advertising dollars or sell leads they generate back to us. 

@Geordie-

Thank you for the kind words :)

Joe Virniq-

Zillow does not sell leads -- any contacts, whether they are via the phone or e-mail, are free on Zillow.

Well at least Drew is stepping up and taking care of the problem..it is nice to NOT see someone getting offended. I also think it is due to all the different sites our listings go out to....some don't update quick enough.

Zillow provides interesting and valuable statistical analysis, however, values have to be checked pretty carefully. Because of their many subscriptions to the various mls's, and the time it takes them to post, there'll be delays in reporting market changes, and errors. Perhaps Zillow should forecast with a variable that they might consider referrig to as 'time till correction' or 'TTC'. whereby Zestimate or 'Z' times the actual update based on market statistics or updated market statistics, 'UMS' equals the 'TTC' which we would express as :

Z1 x UMS=TTC

As an example, the TTC for your Greenhaven listing would be:

Z (55) x UMS (-5) =TTC -275 Which means that Zillow should have corrected the data 275 days ago.

:-)

 Nice post, Jeff. Hope you have a great week.

Accuracy is a huge problem with zillow. It surprises me what they say something is worth and I know better. It makes our job a lot harder.

Zillow? Accuracy? Timely information?

Unfortunately, I hear colleagues all too often complain about Zillow's lack of accuracy and/or lack of timely information.

Hopefully, this will change soon, or it has already changed.

Regarding the property estimates on Zillow...  Zillow is to real estate agents what Salary.com is to HR professionals.  With both sites, I always wonder who is providing that data!

Hey Jeff -  Good points. I find this happens on a lot more sites as well as Zillow. Try homes.com or a few other "free" listing sites. I personally think it helps my phone ring because people find them and email me or call me about them. Anything helps in this market. Bob

I, too, have experienced trouble with Zillow's accuracy and its random nature (listings not showing....then much later popping up).  I'm glad that you called attention to it and that I'm not just Zillow challenged.

Jeff, Thank you for your link to my post.  While the issues we are covering are different in the sense that you are highlighting inaccuracies with exported data and my posts deals with the impact of "no follow' tags on broker exported leads, the results are the same.  Consumers are being short changed in their ability to get the most accurate and up to date information on home listings. 

Unfortunately, most brokers simply don't understand how the Internet works in a comprehensive fashion and more specifically how real estate is generated online.  This is a significant issue in a number of ways and is also going to be increasingly costly with regards to lead generation and consequently profit margins.  It's that simple...ultimately.

I did a search on a listing of mine and nothing showed up. Zillow prompted me to create a new home listing, which I did. After I made the new listing two listings show up.

Mike-

What is the address of the listing you are referring to?

ALL:

Here is some follow-up information after a conversation I had with Drew.

Some errors may arise due to inaccuracies in the public record where Zillow pulls data. Seems this may be why the one listing showed more than once - one was the listing I entered, but the first one came from the public records. Not sure why it would show as a listing, though, unles it is becuase I had a listing at that address and Zillow is thus reporting information they have for that address.

Z57 is a new data partner and now provides feeds from users websites which are provide to Zillow. So if there are errors in your listings on your webpage (a property is still showing as active even though it is now sold) they will show up on Zillow.

The searches are based on the map that appears for a particular area, say 92009 where my newest listing is. Because the property does not show on the initial map it does not appear in the search results. One has to either move the map to locate the area where the listing is so it will show in the results, OR zoom out to show a larger geographic area. The issue is that consumers will not necesarily be aware of this.

I'll be back to respond to other commments.

Jeff

@LaNita

"Accuracy is a huge problem with zillow. It surprises me what they say something is worth and I know better. It makes our job a lot harder."

With all due respect, I think you are approaching this the wrong way. View situations where a consumer refers to a zestimate as a way to demonstrate your local expertise. Zestimates are estimates, not the final word in home values. We absolutely recommend that people consult a local professional before making any decision (that text is right at the top of our zestimate page). I've heard from agents that they love discussing zestimates because they can show the consumer how & why the zestimate is not completely accurate to help domonstrate their local expertise.

Jeff,

Looks like Zillow is zestimating how many listings you have and how long they have been on the market

I agree,  How do they get away with being this bad??

Any site with syndicated listings is going to have inaccuracies because they are coming third party. My problem comes in with not knowing where all my listings are sent. I can correct the ones I know about on Zillow, Trulia and the like but it seems they go to so many places I don't have the hours in the day. I have to agree with Bryant, the cat is gone.

Jeff, I can't keep track of all the listings I have syndicated.  Zillow for the most part has worked well for me...  I feel your pain.

I was also having issues with some postings on Zillow in the past. Totally agree with everyone's assesment of Zestimate. They should totally just get rid of it.

DREW! Thanks for jumping into the fire! Kudos to you!!!!

Jeff,  Yes I have had the same problems with my zillow account.  Don't like it.

As Zillow and others and the others that feed Zillow continue to pass the inaccuracies on to each other, the information on line will be more and more corrupted. 

We agents that deal with the public who get information from the Internet will have to continue to verify the accuracy or lack thereof of listing information.  It's already started.  Wait, it started with Realtor.com when they continued to post and continue to post sold or expired listings. 

Complaining about the numerous innacuracies on Zillow is like complaining that the information you get from a gossip who heard it from the 5th source is not true. 

Zillow's mission is not delivering accurate information.  Zillow's job is using the content on it's web site to generate traffic to sell advertising.  Accuracy is not their forte.  Accuracy is not even critical to their mission. 

In the grand scheme of things, the problem revealed by Lola is far more harmful to real estate practitioners who advertise on the Internet.  We feed content to Zillow which Zillow uses to generate advertising revenue.  Zillow then fails to reciprocate by blocking the back links.  The policy Zillow follows with respect to back links is good SEO for Zillow.  However, it clearly thumbs it's nose at the very population that feeds it. 

Looks like there is some tweeking to be done by Zillow -- and by agents to make the information as accurate as possible.  I am afraid to trust what I see on Zillow at this juncture. 

Jeff sounds like they got a lot of work to do if they want to trust the info that is on their site.  If they do not correct the problems soon it will lose credibility and people will most likely stop using it.

We have had problems with inaccuracies in Zillow listings as well. Duplicate listings and also having listings we had set up with photos and info, only to have the info we had vanish or be added to when Zillow picked up some other feed about the property. We tried to manually change things to get them back current and accurate, but it was never really possible to correct. Someone at zillow did send me an e-mail that talked about they would try and fix things, but then time passed and not much actually happened.  Frustrating.

There is a listing on Zillow that I cannot take down to save my life!  I have the same issues (obviously) and we need to be able to edit for accuracy!

@Lenn-

I wanted to address a couple things from your response. First, Zillow does not block back-links to your site (you can read through the comments on this post for background). Secondly, on the subject of accuracy -- you're incorrect to say that accuracy is not critical to Zillow's mission. Quite the opposite of that is true -- if we do not have accurate information, particularly listings, we lose credibility with out users.

Bob & Carolin-

What is the address of the listing you've had trouble with?

Renee-

While logged into your zillow account, navigate to the home details page of your listing, then click the "edit status" link right next to the for sale price. Select the option "no longer for sale" and then click submit at the bottom of the page. If you'd rather post the address, I can help you remove it from zillow.

Becky - good point. The Internet has changed the face of searching for homes in so many ways. As listing agents we need to understand where our listings are and what information is being shared. We should also understand how the websites consumers are using work.

Jeff

Geordie - sounds like you are having some other issues!

Jwff

Stewart - well this has been a complaitn from day 1. Some are very high, some seem on target, and others are very low. Clearly one should only use this data as PART of the overall picture and not rely on it as the gospel.

Jeff

PMZ Real Estate - well I would be cautious no matter where you post to make sure what you post is what shows up on the site and what consumers will see. Understanding how these sites operate helps us to be better prepared. But obviously some things are out of our control.

Jeff

Cindy - well that was part of my discussion with Drew...taht errors that WE cannot fix make US look bad in front of our clients, but it also impacts the credibility of the site itself.

Jeff

Jeff- I have not seen the incorrect information like you have but do realize that all the syndication that has been going on does create a problem with the days on the market. It is frustrating too that when a listing is syndicated in multiple sources the last place it was syndicated to wipes out everything else. I am constantly going to Zillow to add my own website back in as the main link instead of the syndication site.

Jessica - couldn't agree with you more.The dilemma is keeping up with all the sites that do syndicate listings. I find it impossible to know everywhere a listing might show up nor where they are syndicating from and,hence, one cannot ensure their accuracy. It does continue to make us look bad. Now that I know Zillow pulls a feed from Z57 I just have to be sure my listings on my website are accurate and up to date.

Jeff

Jeff-

I agree it is sometimes hard for agents to know where all their listings are being syndicated to. Are real estate technology providers such as z57 not notifying agents when they add new distribution partners?

Drew - good queston on Z57. That info may be buried somewhere on their site but I don't recall seeing anything (they talk about Oodle and Trulia but not Zillow). The problem is that you have to review all the marekting information in order to find out what they offer, where they syndicate, etc.. If one has time to do that, great, but so often I don't. They may have sent an email but I don't recall seeing one. Clearly I need to pay more attention when I have the time.

Jeff

I've had the same problem with Zillow....very frustrating! I haven't had luck fixing the issues on the site. What really drives me nuts are the values they come up with for my area. I've had a few listing appointments this month where the owners truly believe their home is worth $40,000 more than  the actual value because Zillow told them!

I am so glad to see someone from Zillow on here commenting and helping fix problems. I have an issue with Zillow and that's the values really don't reflect the greatest. I guess it depends on the neighborhood you are in.