Zillow Real Estate & Rentals Reviews

I use to love this app and preferred it over Realtor because you had the option of the street view which allowed you to see the spacing between houses better and could get different angles of the front of the house. And I’m guessing that since there is no longer street view available is why a lot of the homes no longer have pictures of the front of the house; just the satellite view and mapping. The front of the house is a very important selling point, why the update got rid of option is mind boggling to me. Using Realtor more now because I need to see the curb appeal. Thanks for ruining the app 😡 Edited review: First let me say thank you for bringing back the street view, that feature is very helpful. But now I’m disappointed again because after the last update we are no longer able to select homes nearby to compare. When using the satellite view with lot lines selected, you can’t open to view any houses close by. The area off screen when you scroll over to it has that capability for a split second (disappears almost immediately after scrolling over). This app use to be awesome but now it seems we can’t have all its capabilities working at the same time. Please get this app working properly again. I’m finding Redfin a better option right now and it has major glitches. Do better please!

1. I feel like it’s now harder to see the HOA fees when you’re browsing, and those can make a huge difference in the affordability of the listing. Also, I feel like it’s harder to change the mortgage estimate (it used to be easy to zero out the insurance payment if you could see that was covered by HOA — it’s still easy to zero that out, but now I can’t figure out how to make it recalculate the monthly mortgage once I make changes). Also, the new app icon kind of looks like someone sat on the old logo/icon? Not sure if that’s what the effect they were going for... 2. Since Zillow relies on an algorithm to harvest listings from MLS sites, it’s not always as accurate as an actual MLS site (it often misses when properties are sold, for instance). 3. The Zestimate algorithm continues to puzzle me... it doesn’t seem to have much basis in reality, and when my house was on the market the Zestimate would fluctuate wildly, yet the sudden $30,000 drop in the Zestimate wouldn’t be reflected in graph of the recent Zestimates. It was like the 1984 version of the real estate appraisal... 4. BUT, I use Zillow to browse anyway because it’s free and it’s a relatively intuitive app — if I see something I like, I ask my real estate agent about it, and they send me the official MLS listing with the more accurate details.

I have had my condo on here with the wrong info. First time I had it corrected they ended up deleting all my comments for my unit all my descriptions were gone. Then it got fixed fir a small period of time after I rewrote all my descriptions again and then all the sudden my zestimate changed to about 20k lower and my neighbor who has a similar unit only 80 sf smaller had their condo zestimate 20k higher. I’ve been trying to fix that fir awhile now. Then the walkability score I thought was low as I park my car on weekends and walk to dinner, the bars, the grocery, the shops, my errands, entertainment, cleaners, pubs, eateries. The schools are walking distance also but I have no kids so that’s not important to me. When I click the walkability link it brings up another page with someone rises address on it. It sure isn’t mine. So I asked that to be corrected again today. If your going list my Prperty just list it correctly. I really don’t want to email you a few times to get it corrected over and over. Please just correct as I provided proof of this and have yet to see any response or change in my listing. It’s a shame as Zillow was my favorite listing app for years now I’m starting to get disenchanted with them. Sorry but I’m tired of asking for my information to be updated and correct otherwise why have my property listed on their site.

This app has been frustrating at times. The house will be down the street, two miles away, or even all the way across the county from where the map shows it. When it is correct it is awesome! I love to see the inside views and the asking price while on location without having to call anyone. I HOPE they will continue to challenge themselves to IMPROVE this app. Plus! When you are totally not interested in a property, it would be great to be able to delete it from "My List". Just an added wish from a daily user. A MAJOR FLAW is the standard algorithmic equation for determining a homes value. WARNING! If you update an older home and do an extensive renovation, Zillow will not push against their own algorithm to make it reflect the work you have completed. Warning! If you do extensive and costly renovations, you will be dealing with a MUCH lower valuation from Zillow for the property as it existed prior to the extensive renovation. You can state all the renovations and changes that you made BUT! Your new potential buyers will constantly use the old Zillow price against you for negations. It is exhausting! You also get low bids constantly from others after you renovate looking to scalp your post renovation property for nothing due to this flaw in Zillow. This is an easy fix but Zillow doesn’t care. They make excuses and state it is the best they can do. Accuracy is the key.....

I don’t even care about the logo. The fact is that they don’t list most of the details around the houses. Weather they are this or that and what kind of loan is approved for what house. Also most realtors that use this app are only worried about the most funds they can get out of someone. I’ve talked to three different realtors and all see to worry about is the amount I would put down. Weather my loan was conventional or not. And claiming the houses had several offers and come to find out that those offers didn’t exist and the houses I wanted to purchases or even remotely wanted to see are still on the market til this day. So watch out everyone if you know what to look in a house like myself and know the actual worth don’t deal with some of these realtors they are trying to get the most from you and only care about themselves instead of working at it and selling a piece of property not even worth for the ridiculous amount they are asking for. Just a reminder if you don’t have the loan they want or the cash up front you can’t view their property as stated by Alexis in pa. So even if you have a loan if it doesn’t match up you ain’t getting a tour or the house. Also you will get lied to and then told one thing which you know isn’t going to happen. Been waiting three days now. Still haven’t received a email about any of the locations I have inquired

Zillow does not worry about facts and their information can be very inaccurate. I was advised by my realtor to avoid using Zillow because of inaccurate information. The Zillow website is very user friendly, but just beware it can be misleading. After I bought my new home I “claimed it” on the Zillow website. They are showing I purchased the home for much less than I did, but they will not correct this information. I called the tax office just to be sure nothing bogus was going on. It turns out my info and the tax office is the same. So long story short, Zillow is not concerned with showing us inaccurate information. Update: After several email exchanges, scanning and submitting documents proving I was providing factual information, Zillow corrected the information I was disputing. The person who helped me seemed polite and helpful. So I changed my review from a 1 star to 3 stars. The reason for 3 stars is I still have several problems with what happened. First off, I still do not know why false information was provided. Second, I do not know why it was so hard to have the information corrected. Third, and this is my biggest problem...I have asked Zillow repeatedly where did they get their incorrect information, and Zillow has never responded to my question.

I previously liked this app but when I can no longer use the area view from above to see all sides of the house and the back yard, you made my job harder to find properties in another state. The street view is horrible, slow, and if the house property has an alley, you might see a little of the back, and sometimes you can't. What once took 20 secs now takes minutes to slowly navigate and many times I can't even see the side and back of a house. Please bring back the mapping view where I can use my iPhone to drill in, out and flip to the side views and back yard. This is how I narrowed down options plus it helped to zoom out to evaluate the neighborhood. The upgrade also lost some property lines on that view (iOS 10.3.3). This is also important to me. I want a list of 5 homes to look when I go to my hometown and you made that impossible. I will need to drive to them. People are losing opportunities and your value decrease A GREAT DEAL because of these changes. Please bring the satellite area view back rather than the clunky slow street one. Thank you.

Make it apparent the home is in a 55+ community. The homes are very appealing and to get excited and then find out my age disqualifies me from being able to purchase it is a constant disappointment. It’s insulting, which honestly fits right in with the discrimination the 55+ community oozes out into the neighboring communities, where you can be any age as long as your money is green. Not only can you not purchase the homes there if you’re under 55, you can’t use any of their walking trails or parks, or even dog waste bags. These shouldn’t be included in normal searches. I have to check boxes for things I’m looking for. Why can 55+ be a box for the people to check that want and are able to buy one of those homes. It wastes a lot of my time when I’m looking for real estate. Not everyone is familiar with the models, so saying a Meridian plan is available means nothing to novice searchers. Then you also include the school ratings in those listings which further confuses things. You can’t have children living in any of those homes so why do the school grades matter in those listings? It’s misleading, time wasting and frustrating. Everyone is so concerned with discrimination but it seems like this ageism type of discrimination goes under the radar. You’re wasting people’s time with these listings.

I had previously rated this app as 4 * but I have ad to drop that down. It seems lately that when some of these app developers update the apps that it isn’t an improvement but rather the opposite. Such is the case with Zillow. They used to have a place where you could find your saved searches, but not anymore. It’s pointless now to save a search because you can’t go back to find it if you create a different search. Therefore you need to heart any places you like because you won’t find it in a saved search. Also, you used to be able to delete any places, houses, condos etc that you weren’t interested in so as to clear up all the results. Again, not anymore. It makes it quite cumbersome to drill thru all the results when it takes you back to the beginning of your search for whatever reason. Now with that all being said, there are still things I really do like about it. They seem to have the most results for an area than some of the other apps. They also have more stats on a house and are usually up to date as to whether a sale is pending on a place. So while they went backwards a bit, they are still fairly good compared to others.

This app is so invasive that it demands all your time, Particulars for those that are more discerning in the search for life accommodations. It stays active even when you want to sleep. It pops open after you initiate a conversation with it. Think of the most pushy car sales person you ever met who is also a dentist and learned sales on the floor of the NY Stock Exchange. If you like that kind of thing Z is your seller, but if you want support in making a difficult financial and life decision, well oops it's about the only thing available. But it will try to force you into neighborhoods wake you and put you to bed won't let you rest until you pick one and delete all remnants of it from all your devices. In that way it is satisfactory because after you make a decision you get to murder this irritating and obnoxious sales person and you will never want to make another purchase! You will also likely settle for less than you want since the irritation is constant and complete that you are imprisoned by it's overwhelming and constant presence!

Zillow allows me to get a general idea of a property. This allows me to try an make a mor informed decision on which properties I want to look at. Although it is not Zillow’s fault, the pictures can be very deceiving. I wish the realtors would portray some different views. For me I am looking for somewhere I can also park our 38 foot Motorhome. I have found some locations that appear to offer that accommodation but I will not know for certain until I can eye ball the property in person. Again that is no fault of Zillow’s. I love having the satellite view showing the property lines. This tells me if there is enough space beside the house where I could make our own space for the RV but I find most of the houses are just about setting on the property lines as they are which afford us no option to extend a drive to the rear of the house. Over all I am very pleased with Zillow. I would recommend it to get general information. The information Zillow shows and what your real estate agent may or can be somewhat different. So use Zillow as a guide.

Spent HOURS on the site, read all the home listing / price drop / misc emails they send me. Now b/c my husband is a real estate attorney I am not allowed to complete the survey they emailed me? Wow. Not wanting to hear from someone with access the true market? Well, here you go: 1) Zestimate feature is not considered reliable in the industry. 2) Neither is the monthly mortgage payment. 3). Search function is not always helpful. There have been times when I’ve tried to search for a home by the address or street and found no results when Zillow is sending me emails on the exact home that I’m not finding via their search function. 4) Why are homes on the site with no photo’s? If not available on day 1 or 2 that’s acceptable but to never put them up? 4) Schools should be correct - not an estimate. Parents want this information to be correct, not an educated guess. 5) And lastly, home availability is deceiving. Many homes show up as “for sale” until you click to view the photo’s and it changes to “pending”, “sold” or “off market”. Come on Zillow, get your information correct and respect your users time. I have no interest in wasting time looking at homes that I’m not able to buy.

Hello (or should I say “Zellow”) to the makers of Zillow, Let me start by saying great work. This is a great app that helps me efficiently keep up to date with the properties as they come on the market. HOWEVER, I think you should take it a step FURTHER. IMaGinE a world in which your zillow app also contained a calendar that kept track of all your up coming showings, open houses, etc. Currently, I use zillow to contact the landlord, who then contacts me and makes an appointment with me. I put that in my phone calendar, suddenly the day comes and I have forgotten what house I am even going to look at. I am then FORCED to transfer between my calendar app to the zillow app to look up the address and refresh my mind as to what house it is. THEN need to plug that address into my Google Maps app. Do you see how long this takes me? Meanwhile, I am baking in my hot black ford focus, waiting to even leave the driveway. Hey, I am not saying I am a professional in this business, though I have seen every episode of the Netflix Original Selling Sunset in which they sell the most luxurious properties in the country...so maybe I do know a thing or two...

An example of a company being unresponsive to customers over the years, and failing. This used to be the best real estate app out there. It used to give you an advantage over realtors to see the valuable info, or potential discrepancies with listing prices. But now they are outdated and out paced by the others. Info and status takes longer to update than on competitors. Z-estimates used to be spot on, but now they’re 100k below market in the neighborhood I’m looking at (20%!). This damages the market. They are measuring value based solely on house square footage. So if a house is 20% smaller than comp sale, it estimates 20% lower value. No other factors considered, like same neighborhood, larger lot, pool, the fact that NO HOUSE in the city is selling for less, and it’s a seller’s market. So buyers see this estimate, and there’s huge discrepancy between their expectations and the listings which go immediately to pending. Then they lose out/ chase market. Also, I know people have been complaining about the non-close-able listing list that takes up half the screen for at least 5 years. More like 10. I know because I complained to them back then. Is it really that hard to hide the list?! Their competitors listened. Get the competing app. This one’s obsolete.

We use Zillow often and found 2 homes we’ve purchased after finding them on their site first because we don’t buy real estate directly through realtors anymore. Earlier this year something squirrely did happen with the Zillow Zestimates which had 3 of our properties estimated at 50 and 60 thousand dollars below their actual values. After several months the zestimates did climb back up to actual market rates but we were glad we weren’t selling any of our properties at that time because despite Zillow’s warnings, people do strongly depend on zestimate values while home shopping. Zillow states we shouldn’t base our buying or selling decisions on Zestimates as they are only estimates but they’ve been so successful at branding the term and successfully estimating values that buyers and sellers will bank on the zestimate number. Also, a little slow on recording final home sale amounts, other realty sites record them faster. That aside, Zillow only gets better and better and other sites still don’t compare.

Maylin Carbajal was my agent when I bought my beautiful Montgomery, AL home last October 29, 2021. She really made it happen and this was with me living in NYC! I only saw this home on Zillow September 9th and by the 15th of September, I was bidding on it. I am a first time homeowner and she went to great lengths to help me secure this historic home including my placing a bid electronically, dealing with inspections from afar and hiring people to clean this home which hadn’t been occupied for years. She even found a nearby Air B&B when I came out to see it in person before closing. Every step of the way she literally held my hand and worked hard to make sure everything went on schedule. I cannot recommend this hard working, kind and thoughtful agent Maylin Carbajal highly enough. She is the angel that made my 1000 mile move into the home of my dreams possible. And she even negotiated a lower price. It has been such a pleasure to know and work with Maylin Carbajal, such an amazing and gifted agent. I am forever grateful she was my buyer’s agent.

Zillow’s failure to update the information they have published regarding our home in a timely manner has created a safety and privacy issue for us and our young children. Evidently, at one time, the previous owner of our home was in pre-foreclosure. Zillow still lists the property as being in pre-foreclosure. We have had multiple unwanted and uninvited guests driving through our private driveway for seemingly no reason. At first we wondered how it was possible that so many people got so lost that they drove down our dead end road and had to turn around in our driveway. Then, this morning one of them told us Zillow has our home listed as pre-foreclosure and they were here to see it. This is a potentially hazardous situation because we live at the end of a dead-end road, our circle drive is a part of the yard in which our children play, and we are definitely not expecting this level of traffic driving through what is essentially our children’s playground. I have repeatedly attempted to contact Zillow regarding this situation to no avail. The phone number they have listed for customer care directs you to leave a message no matter which options you choose. You do not get to speak to an actual person to have your issue addressed. I have use their system to report the inaccurate information, also to no avail. Clearly Zillow could not care less how their inaccuracies effect the individual homeowner.

I was assigned Lisa DiNoto through this app. I had already decided to go with an agent I previously met at an open house I had stumbled upon, but had not actually used that agent to show me any homes. I decided to request information on a home I found on Zillow. That’s when I met with Lisa. I had no intention of using her other than to see that particular home. But as we viewed the home, I found her to be very helpful and she immediately took me to see a few more in the area. In the back of my mind, I still had no intention of continuing to work with her after we were done that day. As we viewed the last home, she had completely changed my mind. I realized that she was extremely knowledgeable in the areas I was looking and I felt no pressure from her to sway towards any particular property. After almost four months of searching for the perfect home, I have truly enjoyed working with her. She has made this process extremely easy and enjoyable.

I enjoy seeing Zillow’s Zestiment on homes where I have an interest, either now own or and interest in buying. However, it often is inaccurate on properties I own or know about. On Zillow I have limited ability to change the estimate and the change is just for my viewing when it comes to comparable homes and therefore public zestimate. For example one home zestimate is $40k less than the house next door but I can’t use it to calculate estimate. The homes are very similar. Another home is historic but the zestimate compares it to homes listed or recently sold, often with less quality, instead of comparing it to other historic homes, where materials used in construction are of superior quality. Historic homes don’t often come on the market in my area so Zillow would need to expand the search area and/or use the zestimate of historic homes of similar quality not listed or sold recently. Bottom line the zestimate can’t be depended on for real value; but I still enjoy keeping up with homes and their estimated values. I would love for Zillow to add commercial properties to their inventory.

This app looks great and has great potential but boy oh boy does it have problems. 1. The information is outdated, (not always but most times...when I show my realtor the house that fits what my wife and I are looking for it is normally already under contract/pending unless it’s just posted on the market. 2. They send out email notifications and you tap on the link....the app just crashes and pops you out to your home screen EVERY TIME! *you have to memorize the address and then open the app the regular way and search that address* what a waste of sending the link in the first place....other apps don’t do this! 3. Text notifications option would be nice with links that work....Notifications only come in email form. Idk about you but I get enough junk email everyday so the notifications sometimes get lost in all the emails I get In a day. 4. When drawing a line In the area you want to search...there is no way to zoom in or out without having to completely erase your line. There needs to be some way you can pause your outline and pinch in or zoom out to make sure the line you’re drawing is exactly where you want it to be.