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Zillow Seriously Miscalculated


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2021 Sep 18, 9:20pm   8,244 views  120 comments

by Malcolm   ➕follow (0)   💰tip   ignore  

Zillow's new business of flipping houses may have created this recent price surge in California. Unfortunately, that means that they have to be the high bidder in bidding wars. It is a very dangerous business model to be such a large player in a self perpetuated price bubble. I am seeing major discounting in San Diego and this example could signal a real problem for Zillow.



Note the current asking price. Note that it is a Zillow owned home.




Note what Zillow paid for it on July 9th.




Now note what they listed it at, the prices changes, and the current asking price.

How many million dollar homes can Zillow afford to buy, to rehab, and then to sell for less than they paid for it in the first place?

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67   HeadSet   2021 Sep 29, 10:10am  

Malcolm says
while I feel Romney is also a decent person, and I respect him even more now,

Romney voted to impeach Trump for looking in to the Biden corruption in Ukraine. Romney, like all the other bribe takers, think it is a crime for anyone to look into any politician's graft, payola, and other corrupt fringe benefits.
68   Malcolm   2021 Sep 30, 9:10am  

HeadSet says
Romney voted to impeach Trump for looking in to the Biden corruption in Ukraine. Romney, like all the other bribe takers, think it is a crime for anyone to look into any politician's graft, payola, and other corrupt fringe benefits.


That's one point of view. While I like the accomplishments of the Trump administration, I don't accept the whitewashing of his personal actions. He wasn't looking for an objective review, he simply wanted an announcement so that it would raise a cloud of doubt. I don't like people who operate that way, regardless of party affiliation.
69   just_passing_through   2021 Sep 30, 9:13am  

Cloud of suspicion? Jesus, did you hear about all of the fake scandals like Russia gate?

He should have forced an investigation.
70   stfu   2021 Oct 18, 4:52am  

As of today 10.18.2021

"Zillow slid 6.4% in premarket trading, following a Bloomberg report that the company has temporarily stopped its home-buying service due to overwhelming demand."


RIIIIIIGGGHHHHTTTT! "Overwhelming Demand". Yeah you always stop offering a product when it's greeted with "overwhelming demand". This is newspeak for "we can't sustain the losses we are incurring".

Yup, it's been a loss leader for them. Paying $1.50 for $1.00 in revenue like a typical Harvard MBA grad. "We lose money on every transaction but we'll make it up in volume".

Morons.
71   zzyzzx   2021 Oct 18, 6:51am  

stfu says
Zillow slid 6.4% in premarket trading, following a Bloomberg report that the company has temporarily stopped its home-buying service



72   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 18, 7:19am  

Looks like Zillow is done buying homes for a while:

A report from Bloomberg. “Zillow, which acquired more than 3,800 homes in the second quarter, will stop pursuing new home purchases as it works through a backlog of properties already in its pipeline. ‘We are beyond operational capacity in our Zillow Offers business and are not taking on additional contracts to purchase homes at this time,’ a spokesperson for Zillow said.”

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/zillow-pauses-home-purchases-snags-160557830.html

This mean less pressure on home prices?
73   zzyzzx   2021 Oct 18, 8:24am  

joshuatrio says
This mean less pressure on home prices?


I guess they got tired of losing money on their home purchases.
74   EBGuy   2021 Oct 18, 5:59pm  

From Barron's:
“We’re operating within a labor- and supply-constrained economy inside a competitive real estate market, especially in the construction, renovation and closing spaces,” said Chief Operating Officer Jeremy Wacksman in a statement Monday. “We have not been exempt from these market and capacity issues and we now have an operational backlog for renovations and closings. Pausing new contracts will enable us to focus on sellers already under contract with us and our current home inventory.”
75   richwicks   2021 Oct 18, 6:46pm  

Malcolm says
That's one point of view. While I like the accomplishments of the Trump administration, I don't accept the whitewashing of his personal actions. He wasn't looking for an objective review, he simply wanted an announcement so that it would raise a cloud of doubt.


What do you mean a "cloud" of doubt?

There's a ton of sons and daughters of politicians that somehow ended up on the BOD of multiple companies in Ukraine, a nation the United States overthrew.

Our government is a fucking JOKE, and the main problem is there's so many fucking goobers that just say "well that can't be true! The teeeveeee would tell me if that were true!"

It's fucking true. We don't have a press, we don't have a media, we have propaganda, and their job is to cover for the COMPLETE criminality of our government. That's their ONLY job.
76   Patrick   2021 Oct 18, 10:56pm  

richwicks says
the main problem is there's so many fucking goobers that just say "well that can't be true! The teeeveeee would tell me if that were true!"


That is the problem in a nutshell.

They just refuse to believe things that would cause them anxiety.
77   zzyzzx   2021 Oct 19, 4:32am  

EBGuy says
From Barron's:
“We’re operating within a labor- and supply-constrained economy inside a competitive real estate market, especially in the construction, renovation and closing spaces,” said Chief Operating Officer Jeremy Wacksman in a statement Monday. “We have not been exempt from these market and capacity issues and we now have an operational backlog for renovations and closings. Pausing new contracts will enable us to focus on sellers already under contract with us and our current home inventory.”


Hard to believe since it's widely known that they do little or nothing to the houses.
78   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 19, 10:43am  

A report from Bloomberg. “Zillow’s iBuying business loses money, so stopping purchases should help its bottom line, analyst Ygal Arounian said in a note. ‘This feels like they bought way too many homes and they’re trying to work off that excess supply,’ said Jonathan Miller, president of appraisal firm Miller Samuel.”

From CNN Business. “iBuyer share in some cities, like Phoenix, Atlanta or Charlotte, North Carolina, now tops 5%. ‘Zillow just kept barreling down and now they’ve hit this wall,’ said Mike DelPrete, an independent real estate technology strategist. This is not the situation a growth-focused company wants to be in, he said. ‘If you’re trying to be number one in the market, slamming on the brakes is one of the worst things you can do,’ said DelPrete.”

From KLKN on Nebraska. “It was a housing market frenzy just a few months ago with homes getting snatched up within hours and lots of buyers being forced to make some tough and risky decisions. ‘One of the terms that would be tossed out to be more competitive earlier this spring was to waive inspections. So, they were just buying the house as is, not doing an inspection, you just get what you get. That was a little scary,’ Melanie Dawkins, with Red Door Realty, said.”

“The Lincoln housing market has turned the corner and things are looking up for buyers and sellers. Dawkins says it’s technically still a sellers market but things have slowed down substantially and given everyone more time to think about their decisions. ‘Right now, I can say we’re gonna go look at a handful of these. You can think about them overnight, let’s talk about it tomorrow and see what you think of it. That’s a lot better for making such an amazingly huge decision. This is the most expensive purchase you’ll ever make,’ Dawkins said.”

http://housingbubble.blog/?p=5263
79   Automan Empire   2021 Oct 19, 12:27pm  

My understanding of Zillow's buy and flip arm is, they count the future necessary repairs as part of their "buy price" which artificially humps retail housing prices ever higher. Works a treat while the bubble is growing and they're flipping lots of homes at bubble inflated prices while buying distressed low on the back end. Can fall the F apart quickly once the bubble bursts. Hard to say if this isn't anticipating the usual winter slowdown of retail home sales, or is the beginning of a long term slide in housing prices.

Zillow definitely pumping air into the real estate bubble the way they report the "purchase price" of their flipper homes.
80   SunnyvaleCA   2021 Oct 19, 12:44pm  

I wish Zillow would offer a service here in silicon valley. From what I can see of the standard real-estate agents, Zillow couldn't be worse. At least the bait-and-switch tactics would happen more quickly and more directly.
81   SunnyvaleCA   2021 Oct 19, 12:47pm  

Does anyone think there might be a huge scramble of California sellers wishing to lock in the current capital gains tax rates? I've been thinking that federal long-term capital gains may increase 10 percentage points, costing me an additional $100k.
82   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 20, 8:49am  

Fox 10 Phoenix in Arizona. “There has been a bit of a jolt to the real estate market, as Zillow announced it is halting its home buying program, called Zillow Offers, in Phoenix and other cities. ‘Zillow’s inventory has grown 1,000% since last year in Phoenix. Just in Phoenix,’ said Tina Tamboer, a Senior Analyst with The Cromford Report. ‘When they purchase a home, they have to sell it right away,’ said Tamboer. ‘Sometimes, you have to wait for that inventory to dissipate.'”

The Boston Globe. “The Greater Boston Association of Realtors, which tracks activity in 64 cities and towns in Eastern Massachusetts. It said the typical single-family home sold for $750,000 in September, a record for the month and up 10 percent from September 2020, but down 4 percent from August and the lowest median price in six months. That plateau comes as sales volume slows, particularly for single-family homes, which fell 13 percent from the same time last year, even as listings trended upward at the start of the traditionally busier fall season.”
83   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 25, 9:01am  

A report from Pleasanton Weekly in California. “Buyer behavior has shifted during the second half of 2021 and is likely to continue into next year said Tina Hand, 2021 president of the Bay East Association of Realtors. Hand said buyers are backing off and sellers aren’t used to that. Asked how sellers are responding, Hand said, ‘I think they are a bit surprised that they aren’t getting the prices we were seeing even as recently as August and the beginning of September. They haven’t quite woken to the fact that the market is shifting. Sellers had been getting 15 or 20 multiple bids going $200,000 to $400,000 over the asking price, and that’s not happening,’ she said.”

“From August to September, the median sales price for a single-family home in Pleasanton dropped from $1.79 million to $1.56 million. Hand said, ‘There’s talk about a ‘housing bubble’ but the factors just aren’t there; this is not 2008. What happened then is not going to happen in 2021.'”
84   RWSGFY   2021 Oct 25, 9:20am  

joshuatrio says
“From August to September, the median sales price for a single-family home in Pleasanton dropped from $1.79 million to $1.56 million. Hand said, ‘There’s talk about a ‘housing bubble’ but the factors just aren’t there; this is not 2008. What happened then is not going to happen in 2021.'”


"This time it's different!"
85   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 27, 6:45am  

A report from WTOP. “About 1 million U.S. homeowners with a mortgage are still in some stage of a mortgage payment forbearance program with their lender. The current rate of delinquencies at all stages is 3.5%, and that is historically high. ‘The last time we saw this high of a level was back in 2008 and 2009 during the financial crisis. But what is different this time is that the foreclosure rate is at a historic low because of the forbearance program,’ said Lawrence Yun, chief economist at the National Association of Realtors.”
86   HeadSet   2021 Oct 27, 12:11pm  

joshuatrio says
said Lawrence Yun

Lawrence Yun? When it comes to wrong predictions, that fellow is a hole with no bottom.
87   Ceffer   2021 Oct 27, 12:35pm  

HeadSet says
When it comes to wrong predictions, that fellow is a hole with no bottom.

Now, just what gender would that be?
88   Booger   2021 Oct 27, 2:58pm  

HeadSet says
joshuatrio says
said Lawrence Yun

Lawrence Yun? When it comes to wrong predictions, that fellow is a hole with no bottom.


Paid shill.
89   joshuatrio   2021 Oct 28, 10:24am  

A report from Gizmodo. “Zillow has been hemorrhaging cash in the home-buying arms race in certain markets. Bloomberg wrote: ‘Zillow put a record number of homes on the market in September. It also cut prices on nearly half of its U.S. listings in the third quarter.’ In some markets like Atlanta, Georgia, and Phoenix, Arizona, Zillow losing money on listings is particularly apparent, Bloomberg wrote. Its 250 active listings in Phoenix are about 6% under market price, which University of Colorado Boulder real estate expert Mike DelPrete told Bloomberg was about $29,000 off for the typical home.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/zillows-flips-are-now-flops/ar-AAQ0OPg
90   Malcolm   2021 Oct 28, 4:39pm  

zzyzzx says
I guess they got tired of losing money on their home purchases.


It's hysterical. Every single one in my area that is listed is now listed for below what Zillow paid for it. ALL OF THEM!!!!
91   Malcolm   2021 Oct 30, 9:15am  

Here is an interesting NY Post story giving a little detail into what we noticed.

https://nypost.com/2021/10/28/zillows-flips-flop-hurting-profits-but-benefitting-homeowners/

After a real estate agent made him a lower offer than Zillow, Richard Flor of the Phoenix suburb Tolleson, Arizona decided to sell to the company this summer. Zillow paid him approximately $412,000 and charged only a 1 percent fee on the sale of his three-bedroom, three-bathroom rental property. Two weeks later, after making light repairs, Zillow listed the property for $387,000 — $3,000 less than what the agent had offered.
92   zzyzzx   2021 Nov 1, 12:08pm  

https://finance.yahoo.com/m/94fb431f-7378-387c-a3bf-b4b668eb223d/zillow-stock-dives-after.html

Zillow stock dives after analyst highlights two-thirds of homes bought are underwater
93   Blue   2021 Nov 1, 1:20pm  

zzyzzx says
https://finance.yahoo.com/m/94fb431f-7378-387c-a3bf-b4b668eb223d/zillow-stock-dives-after.html

Zillow stock dives after analyst highlights two-thirds of homes bought are underwater

That's a good news for now. But give inflation and money creation its just a pause.
94   EBGuy   2021 Nov 1, 2:23pm  

Here's one of their competitors in the iBuyer space:
Instant homebuyer Offerpad quietly became a publicly traded business Thursday, after it merged with a blank check company led by former Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff one day earlier.
...
Rascoff departed from Zillow in early 2019, due in part to criticisms he didn’t bring the home listings giant into iBuying at a rapid enough pace. A spokesperson for Rascoff reached out to say that he did not step down as CEO due to disagreements over Zillow’s iBuying program.*
..
Offerpad turned a $9.2 million profit in second quarter, a rare feat in iBuying in which the cost to purchase homes plus operating expenses traditionally exceed revenues from reselling the home. But Bair acknowledged last month that Offerpad would likely lose money the next two quarters thanks to increased marketing costs and ramping up its engineer and product teams.

Veering into Change Bank model of profitability. Could be a boon for home buyers, though. Investor capital used to fix up homes that are sold at a loss.
96   EBGuy   2021 Nov 2, 6:33pm  

Way to call this one early Malcolm...
The company plans to take writedowns of as much as $569 million and reduce its workforce by 25% as it winds down the business in coming months, according to a statement Tuesday. Zillow shares plunged as much as 11% to $76.22 in late trading.
The decision to abandon home flipping comes as the company’s third-quarter results showed it lost more than $380 million in the operation, called Zillow Offers. The business hit a major snag in recent months as Zillow tweaked its algorithms to make more aggressive offers, causing it to overpay for houses just as the heated U.S. market began to cool slightly.
97   RWSGFY   2021 Nov 2, 7:28pm  

Fucking morons snorted their own product.
98   EBGuy   2021 Nov 2, 8:19pm  

Here's the Big Four Three iBuyers.
The iBuying industry is still relatively small, but it's starting to gain serious traction. A recent report by Zillow analyzed the "big four" iBuyers: Zillow, Offerpad, Opendoor, and Redfin (NASDAQ: RDFN). It found that the four companies purchased a total of more than 15,000 homes in the second quarter of 2021 and that iBuying accounted for 1% of the U.S. housing market for the first time ever.
99   zzyzzx   2021 Nov 3, 9:29am  

https://finance.yahoo.com/m/cde86b19-937a-3952-babe-2fae3c07f344/zillow-is-offloading-7-000.html

Zillow is offloading 7,000 homes — raising ‘red flags’ about the real-estate market
100   Malcolm   2021 Nov 3, 3:35pm  

My all-time favorite real estate quote: “We’ve determined the unpredictability in forecasting home prices far exceeds what we anticipated and continuing to scale Zillow Offers would result in too much earnings and balance-sheet volatility,” said CEO Rich Barton in a statement.

https://therealdeal.com/2021/11/02/zillow-calls-it-quits-on-ibuying-will-lay-off-25-of-staff/

So, that begs the question. If Zillow can't forecast home values, isn't that a problem for those who rely on Zillow forecasts?
101   Booger   2021 Nov 3, 3:55pm  

$65.47/sh -21.73 (-24.92%)
At close: 4:00PM EDT
102   Patrick   2021 Nov 3, 3:57pm  

Wow.
103   mell   2021 Nov 3, 11:00pm  

Zillow bought houses in shit areas for shit prices cause their "AI" told them so. This is not a red flag for the real estate market, it just once again proves how much better humans are at activities that require instinct such as house flipping
104   Malcolm   2022 Jul 25, 4:50pm  

Seattle-based Zillow faces another shareholder suit over failed house-flipping business

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/seattle-based-zillow-faces-another-shareholder-suit-over-failed-house-flipping-business/

It looks like this is going to keep haunting them for years.
105   Patrick   2022 Jul 25, 5:47pm  

Thanks @Malcolm

I'm happy to hear that Zillow is still going downhill. I did not enjoy working for them, especially not after they figured out that I'm the patrick.net guy.
106   just_passing_through   2022 Jul 25, 7:48pm  

Patrick says

especially not after they figured out that I'm the patrick.net guy.


What was THAT like? haha

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