The Ze$timate
Issue 48 - September 3rd, 2021
The Zillow Zestimate is legendary. It turned Zillow into a hyper growth machine from its earliest days, and it is the feature that made Zillow one of the web’s most highly visited pages during its first year of launch.
Humans are nosy, and we especially love knowing what our prized possession, and most likely one of our biggest investments, is “worth”. We also love checking on our friend’s homes, or our future in-laws homes to sniff out the value. This feature is now an incredible lead generation source for Zillow’s in-house iBuying business where they will submit an offer on your house in minutes if you want to see one!
The Zestimate is getting more and more accurate over time, but it is not always the most dialed in value wise. You need to consider the most recent SOLD (not for sale) homes in your immediate neighborhood to get a true sense of accurate market value. If you are just wanting a ballpark range, then the Zestimate most likely does the trick, but don’t be surprised when it is extremely overvalued or sometimes extremely undervalued once you speak with an agent or do some more research on your own when diving into the granular data.
While we are on the topic, you should check out this Saturday Night Live Zillow Skit from earlier this year.
Enjoy the Labor Day weekend!
Newsworthy Links To Share
An Abu Dhabi-based sovereign wealth fund is teaming up with Dallas-based real estate investment firm Crow Holdings to capitalize on the red-hot US industrial real estate market. According to Pensions & Investments, the companies plan to develop $1 billion of Class A industrial properties across the country. (Real Deal NYC)
Hines , a global real estate developer with a $160 billion portfolio, is making a statement in Austin, TX. It plans to build the city’s first 100% timber mixed-use project. Specifically, it’s the first project to use only timber for residential development. (CoStar)
The “skinniest” townhome in West Village NYC hits the market again. The house contains a perfectly respectable 999 square feet of living space, but it’s distributed over three floors (there’s also a basement, but the layout is so tight, that, at least in the past, it was accessed via a trapdoor in the kitchen). (Curbed)
In a study to find the best and worst American housing markets in 2021, Wallethub identified Frisco, Texas, as the best place in the country to buy a house due to its affordability and economic environment. Three other Texas cities—McKinney, Denton, and Allen—made the top ten. (Wallethub)
While home prices continue hitting new highs, economists anticipate that growth will slow down for the rest of the year as more inventory is introduced. However, the anticipated deceleration hasn’t shown up yet in Case-Shiller because it’s a lagging indicator (specifically, a rolling 3-month average). (CRE Daily)
What’s In The Water At Zillow? An Inside Look At Its Track Record Of Alumni-Spawned Startups: Founders of numerous funded startups all list Zillow among their former employers. Those startups include Sift, proptech startup Divvy Homes, health care financial wellness company Amino, proptech startup Pacaso–which helps people own second homes–as well as career and salary website Glassdoor. Zillow itself, now a larger branch on the Seattle family tech tree, is the product of older tech giants in the Pacific Northwest: The real estate marketplace has roots in Expedia and Microsoft.(CrunchBase)
Blueprint Title raises $16 million dollar Series B to grow its title-focused “insurtech” business. (TechCrunch)
Homelight raises $363 million to expand its “cash offer” and “trade-in services” across the entire country. In May, HomeLight got a $100 million credit line from Credit Suisse to expand its Cash Offer and Trade-in services. With these services, HomeLight purchases a client’s new house for all cash and later sells the property to the client for a fee. Trade-in lets the buyer sell their existing home to HomeLight to access their equity to buy their new home. HomeLight typically owns a house for 41 days on average. (San Francisco Business Journal)
Palo Alto fintech Point raises $1 billion in new capital commitments from Mill Valley-based Redwood Trust and other major investors buy stakes in Americans’ home equity. (San Francisco Business Journal)