Zillow.oops

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A week ago, as i was driving home from a listing appointment, I had my car’s radio tuned onto NPR’s All Things Considered, and Michelle Norris was interviewing Rick Barton, a guy who had just launched a new web site, zillow.com. With a couple of mouse clicks, you are supposed to be able to get the market value of your house.

OK, I get paid the big bucks for figuring out the market values of my clients’ homes, and I had spent the better part of the day before on a thorough market analysis of a cute little house in DC.  I had prepared an analysis of homes currently for sale – the competition.  Then, I looked at what was under contract.  Finally, I got to the actual "comps", similar homes nearby that had recently sold. Then I went through a complicated series of comparisons to figure out what my new listing is likely to sell for, using analytical skill and gut instinct.

Now, in the District, comparing neighboring homes for a price analysis can be much like comparing apples and, no, not oranges, but apples to monkeys.  A lot of our housing stock went up in the 1920s and 30s, and each neighborhood is peppered with it’s share of mid century homes.  There is not only rich architectural diversity, but the property condition of each home is a crucial component of any pricing exercise.

So, could it be that I was being replace by a web site?  I tried to log on that night, but I misspelled "zillow" and got nowhere.  Then, today, I managed to sign onto the real zillow.com. 

One thing every real estate agent knows is the current market value of her own home, so I thougth that would be a good test.  I typed in my address, clicked on the magic button, and then voila!  It gave me the assessed value of my house, to the penny.  But that isn’t the market value – or anything close. 

So, is it just my house that got a goofy outcome? I invite my readers to do a little mouse click onto the link, and let me know what happens!

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