[summer]

Many real estate agents worry that Zillow could be a first step in an online evolution that could threaten their $60 billion commission-based business, just as Expedia, Travelocity and other online sites disrupted the business of travel agents...

It's just fascinating to see how the internet keeps changing business models. Consumers have more and more power, but to use that power, they have to be online, and be willing to learn more.

[saveliberty]

Zillow requires flash which isn't great for pcs. It's probably fine for Macs

[FreePaul]

I've only had to deal directly with four real estate agents. Two were completely dishonest and cost me unnecessary time and money. The other two were top notch straightforward in all respects. So, I guess that averages out to OK in the real estate field. For good reason there are changes coming about in real estate selling as well as changes in other businesses.

[hc87]

There is a scary amount of information available on Zillow. I would be curious as to whether others think their home valuation numbers are valid. The number that they had for my house was about 10-12% over the number that a local real estate broker gave me last summer.

[Drango]

Travel agents have taken a major hit. Real estate agents need to evolve too.

[Vision]

I did a comp on Zillow and it was off $50,000. Those good for nothing real estate agents just don't do anything /rolling eyes

[montag813]

The problem with Zillow is accuracy. A condo in my (NYC) building sold last week for $123,000 more than its "zEstimate" on Zillow. So clearly they are understimating the market by a large degree. If so it does a disservice to sellers.

[tubebender]

Bump

[babyface00]

I'm in the industry, although not a realtor.

One of the problems I see with taking brokers and agents out of the equation is that the likely replacement is going to be lawyers.

Buying a house is a huge investment. Sure, if the buyer and seller are both honest, its a relatively simple transaction and everyone comes out happy in the end. However, anyone who's been on ebay knows that this isn't always the case.

Inserting brokers and agents into the transaction doesn't necessarily fix all the potential problems, but it does address a lot of them. Where agents and brokers are "overpaid" is when the home being sold is very desirable, and the buyer is knowledgeable and either prequalified or has cash. The reality, however, is that just about every home for sale has problems and quirks and most buyers either don't understand financing, or have problems getting it, or have never gone through a transaction of this magnitude before. Could be, also, that the buyer is moving into an unfamiliar area and needs the expertise of someone who knows the neighborhoods to guide their purchase.

In those cases, the brokers and agents work very hard and when you consider the probable alternative - getting lawyers involved instead (which I understand is already part of the process in many states), their commission doesn't sound all that extravagant.

I'm no fan of realtors, and they certainly shouldn't be mandated, but I'm not sure that this alternative is better for buyers and sellers. I guess a lot would depend on the way the site is structured.

Beyond that, I'm not sure how legal this site would be in all states. I'm not a lawyer either, but if this is just another FSBO site, those haven't been very effective yet, largely because of the problems above.

[TXBSAFH]

Zillow is dead off prices on my street. A house 4 doors down from me is appraised a t 112K, it sold last month for 126K.

[D-Chivas]

A lot of tax assessor and county recorder data is available on the web. You've just got to know where to look for it.

I'd rather do the digging myself than rely on some third-party web site to try to figure it out.

The real estate industry is looking at a sea change in the coming years. These companies who are grabbing 6% or 7% of the selling price of a house better enjoy it while it lasts, because these days will soon be over.

[devane617]

Wal-Mart - ization of the real estate industry. The world is changing...

[Always Right]

Zillow is interesting to get information, although it does not have info in my area yet. However, unless your home is nearly identical to the surrounding homes it is not going to be all that accurate. You really have to know the area and visit the home to be a fair judge of value. Just a couple of blocks may not seem like much to the computer, but it could make a world of difference in the real world. Of course Realtors are not the most trustworthy source of valuation either.

[Rebelbase]

I'm having a blast watching the Realtors squirm over these new companies and buy/sell techniques.

On land sales I've showed people how to use the Realtor provided info (online services, magazines, call for address, etc) to get enough data to go to the county GIS to find out who the owner is and deal directly with them.

In a majority of cases the owner is more than happy to talk with a prospetcive buyer about his property in a way a Realtor never could. There's also the ability to strike a deal when the listing contract ends and save the 3rd party fee.

Realtors hate me.

[ex-Texan]

There is a new real estate service in Oregon that offers to sell homes for 1% commissions. Of course, I'm not advocating that anybody purchase real estate now at today's inflated prices. But if you are selling . . .

[cynicalman]

Just looked up my house I sold 14 months ago. It is valued at $20,000 less than what I sold it at 14 months ago. Not sure this is a web site one can rely on.

[nov7freedomday]

I should state up front, I am an appraiser in Louisiana. However, I only do commercial type property appraisals.

With that said, it is extremely difficult to estimate value of a specific property by using statistics. You will always be using data that includes the best of the best and the worst of the worst. If you have a quality home, it will be undervalued. If you have a crappy home, it will be over valued.

If you live in or are interested in a large subdivision of tract or spec homes in a large (top 100) metro area, you stand a better than average chance of getting a value estimate within 10% of the sales price.

Please note however, you will not get financing for your new home without an appraisal. FIRREA regulations require it for all federal insured financial institutions.

Personally I think its a waste of time for most areas and if you are inexperienced in real estate you would be foolish not to use a "qualified" real estate agent

[beaware]

Disclosure: I am a Realtor. If folks rely on this for prices to sell at, my job will be much easier. However buyers looking at the prices listed in MLS will be horrified! All the comparisons that I did in Central Florida were low by around 25%.

That aside, my biggest mistake in working with clients is usually too much information. I always have my clients see the trends. However past performance is not indicative of future performance!

If folks would have seen this 2 years ago, they would still be living in an apartment waiting for the "bubble" to burst.

[Drango]

This yahoo site has been giving home values for at least a year or two
http://realestate.yahoo.com/re/homevalues/

Must be different data??? And yeah, no flash.

[Labyrinthos]

Many real estate agents worry that Zillow could be a first step in an online evolution that could threaten their $60 billion commission-based business, just as Expedia, Travelocity and other online sites disrupted the business of travel agents...

Another area of change is in the employment area. We recently hired an in-house accountant through an online "help wanted" database. We placed the online ad because we received only three responses to the ad that we ran for a week in the local daily newspaper. The online ad was one-third the cost of the print ad and we received 16 quality responses.

[wouldntbprudent]

Real estate agents have to go the way of travel agents. They will not continue to add value to the process. There's no way the real estate process won't be almost completely overcome by direct buyer-to-seller technologies.