How the Top Agent on Zillow badge is awarded How the Top Agent on Zillow badge benefits agents Where you can find the Top Agent on Zillow badge Zillow is excited to officially launch a new Top Agent on Zillow badge. The badge is more than just recognition for high-performers – it’s also an important signal to let customers know they’re working with a top-performing agent. Near the end of 2022, Zillow conducted a series of in-depth focus groups with agents to study what sets high-performers apart from everyone else. Our researchers spoke to all kinds of professionals – team leads, brokers, in ..read more

The market has now endured more than a year of higher interest rates without a national price crash. Sales volume of existing homes in June was down nearly 19% from a year earlier. Stifled by mortgage rates at 21-year highs and inventory that’s slowly climbing from historic lows, competition has been especially relentless for entry-level homes. See the numbers in your market or any major metro in the US. Take Kansas City, where the average home of any type stayed on the market for a range of just three to four days during spring and early summer this year. (And for the record, every spring a ..read more

Three out of four buyers who purchased a home in the past two years reported having at least one regret about the home they bought, according to a 2022 Zillow survey. And about 8 in 10 of those successful buyers say they had to make at least one compromise in order to afford a home. Given the subsequent drop in inventory and more than doubling of interest rates since then, it’s fair to assume today’s buyers are under even more pressure. Those pressures put buyers at risk of purchasing a home that is less than ideal. When we asked about buyer regrets on Facebook, more than 5,000 people shared t ..read more

Here are two real estate news headlines from The New York Times: Mortgage Rates Too High? (Blame the Fed, Wall Street and Your Neighbor.) With Rates This Low, Where’s the Boom? Before you read the next sentence, try to guess the 30-year fixed mortgage rate at the time each article was published. The first story appeared last fall, when rates surged to 6.95%. The second story, however, is from 1993, when rates were so “low,” they dropped all the way to… 7.10%. What’s going on here? These headlines illustrate the power of perspective. Our brains rely on mental shortcuts to make judgments and ..read more

The wild housing swings of the last three years have made it hard to stop and think about what’s best for agents, buyers, and sellers alike. Sure, lower mortgage rates would be great. But sub-3% rates and sudden pandemic moving trends shocked the market into where we are today.  The sweet spot is a balanced market, which occurs when demand from buyers meets supply from sellers. Experts typically define that as a 6-month housing supply. At that point, the market finds a rhythm that suits all parties involved. Commissions may not pile up like they did during 2021, but agents can benefit fro ..read more

There’s a new presence at the center of Zillow’s latest ad campaign: You. Agents guiding clients to the right homes, agents helping clients manage excessive paperwork and open houses, and in one case, agents saving clients from paranormal activity. While we’ve always been committed to helping Zillow Premier Agent partners succeed, we’re making you the focus of the story we’re telling consumers like never before. In many industries, companies are struggling to strike the right balance between developing new technology and supporting human services. At Zillow, we’re hyper-focused on investing i ..read more

Forget that white kitchen. Recent and prospective home buyers have apparently moved on to moodier interiors, especially those with dusky gray walls, according to a recent Zillow® analysis of paint color preferences. The research* finds that buyers would offer thousands more for a place with dark gray walls than one with white walls. How much more? Homes with a graphite gray kitchen could sell for about $2,512 more than similar homes painted white, while homes with a dark gray living room could fetch $1,755 more. Even a lighter pewter shade could command $2,553 more than expected. Meanwhile, a ..read more

Your real estate website is often the first representation of you or your brokerage that your potential clients encounter. Given that they’re considering one of the biggest financial decisions of their lives, you’ll want your site to convey trustworthiness, expertise, and an outstanding customer experience. To start, you’ll definitely want to cover all the basics — bio, contact info, a responsive site that meets today’s functionality standards, and property listings connected to a CRM, if possible. But here, we’ll go deeper into the ways you can signal trust and value to hopeful buyers and sel ..read more

The idea is always top of mind at Zillow: Our Premier Agent partners are central to our success. We write it often, we post it often, and we say it out loud even more. When we collaborate to elevate the customer experience above all else, we all win, and so do our customers. With this in mind, we’ve listened closely to your feedback. Taking it all in, we’ve redesigned Best of Zillow to reward partners who consistently delight our shared customers. I truly believe these are the strongest developments in the program yet, and I think you’ll agree. The new Best of Zillow benefits We’re very excite ..read more

With home shopping season in full swing, competition for some homes is at a fever pitch. In many markets, desirable homes are selling in less than a week. Nationally, more than a third are selling above list price — a smaller share than recent years, but more than pre-pandemic spring shopping seasons. But all of this often depends on a home’s starting price. “We’re seeing those bidding wars happening again, and it’s even more pronounced for the lower-price tier homes,” says Zillow Senior Economist Nicole Bachaud. “If I’m blocked by affordability and can no longer afford that mid-price home, I ..read more