The industry has been buzzing this month since real estate titan Zillow announced it acquired ShowingTime—and presumably its network of nearly 1 million agents and hundreds of multiple listing services—for $500 million. Since transforming into a brokerage last year, the tech giant has become a major competitor to brokers and agents throughout the nation, prompting many to adjust strategies and reassess business relationships.
“I think that brokers and agents have already shown some concern about this. Zillow is a competing broker now, and I don’t know that brokers and agents are comfortable with a single broker having control over the scheduling process. Imagine if, say, Keller Williams had purchased ShowingTime—would any other agents or brokers use it?” asked Joseph Rand, chief creative officer at Howard Hanna | Rand Realty in New City, N.Y. and executive director of Broker Public Portal.
Following Zillow’s entrance into the brokerage world, RISMedia conducted a survey of more than 2,000 real estate professionals and found that 87% considered Zillow’s foray into the brokerage space as a “negative” for the real estate industry at large, while only 3% said it was “positive.”
Kuba Jewgieniew, founder and president of Realty ONE Group, for one, admires the brand’s aggressive expansion to control the end-to-end experience for homebuyers by scaling its data capabilities and fintech solutions, and he notes that if Zillow didn’t do it now, someone else would by the end of the year.
The current rate of international money flowing into the U.S. real estate industry is “staggering,” he says, and everyone is racing for data-based solutions, including showing services. Jewgieniew notes that Zillow paid a very high premium for ShowingTime, but that inflated cost was almost immediately justified on Wall Street as its stock price soared to an all-time high market capitalization of $53.6 billion, which more than covers the amount of the transaction.
“Zillow wants to keep business in their ecosystem now,” Jewgieniew says, referencing other American brands Tesla and Amazon, which have successfully transitioned into broader business models. “Zillow began as a lead-generation company and has diversified into a data company. They are ahead of brokerages and title (firms) in terms of fintech. They are streamlining it and making it more efficient.”
Jewgieniew does, however, say there are approximately 2,000 tech-enabled tools available to real estate agents, and no one should be beholden to any one single application or function.
For instance, a new showing service called Local Showings is set to launch imminently, according to an announcement last week from Delta Media Group. The family-owned real estate brokerage technology firm is led by CEO and owner Michael Minard, who says its showing service is well over “90% complete.” He notes that Delta already works with MLSs that cover 97% of the properties sold in the U.S.
“We have been inundated with calls from real estate brokerage customers, non-customers and MLSs to build an independent system,” Minard says. “The industry needs a showing service that is not beholden to Wall Street.”
Additionally, another tool called SentriKey Showing ServiceTM will be available to all state and local REALTOR® boards whether or not SentriLock is their lockbox provider.
“Competition benefits consumers, whether we see that play out through the nation’s MLS system or with the numerous resources accessible to agents and their clients. Overall, we remain focused on finding new innovations that will ensure REALTORS® have every tool at their disposal to best serve clients and maximize efficiency,” says Bob Goldberg, CEO of the National Association of REALTORS®.
With ShowingTime now aligned with Zillow, some agents and brokers may look to cut ties with the company. According to broker/owner of RE/MAX Capital Realty, Kendall Bonner, mixed emotions surrounding the acquisition seem to stem from a lack of transparency on Zillow’s part.
“I think the overall industry response is mixed and confused, which is understandable. Clarity of mission and vision is key for any business,” says Bonner. “Our understanding of the mission and vision of Zillow is unclear; their words and their actions do not appear to be in alignment. They say that they acquired Showtime for R&D and to fix inefficiencies but fail to clarify where those inefficiencies exist. The reality appears that they are actually seeking valuable data, and what remains unclear, for some of us, is what they plan to do with that data.”
In a statement released earlier this month with news of the ShowingTime purchase, Errol Samuelson, chief industry development officer at Zillow Group, said, “ShowingTime will remain an open platform available to all industry participants, and we expect to grow ShowingTime’s engagement through all channels to ensure touring is easier for the industry and consumers.”
Andrew King is a contributing editor to RISMedia.
We are the owners of our listing data. Zillow has demonstrated to us that we have been asleep at the wheel. Having a tech company that is now a true brokerage company enter our MLS systems and take advantage of the IDX system was the final straw. No brokerage should have control over a platform like “Showing Time”. Remember Realtor.com was sold to News Corp as well as Realogy. I ask the leaders of our MLS systems to start advertising their portal sites in the best interests of their participants. We went from a single MLS system to a regional one with the OneKey MLS. It is time for us to take back control. Real Estate is specific to their respective markets. Charge a $100 dollar participant fee to build a war chest. Let’s just put in perspective $100x 50K participants= 5 Million! There is a reason to merge for scale. Now is the time for us to band together and do what’s best for our individual company’s!
I think our Attorneys at NAR should weigh in on the acquistion of BOTH Showingtime and DotLoop. At this point I am not sure either of those should be used anymore
Zillow has proven time after time, over and over again that they cannot be trusted. They say one thing and the opposite as a propaganda of disinformation.
Zillow for years and years have tried their best to pick the pockets of real estate agents. I never received royalty payments from Zillow from using my real estate photos or my narrative about properties giving the impressions to consumers that it came from them.
For years their strategy has been to steal eyeballs from our website and reselling our own listings back to agents.
The 800 lbs gorilla is conquering territory again.
It’s hard to take the comments in the article seriously. Certainly a lack of vision and industry insight. One is playing safe with the gorilla.
NAR and state associations better step up or the end is coming. Our biggest asset to Zillow is our data. MLS’s should cease providing this data to Zillow and what them struggle as buyers and renters pivot to Realtor.com and others.
Why would we give our data to Zillow? They are competitors. They are getting our data for free or in the case of rentals payment for rental listings. They sell leads back to us off our data. Now they have ShowingTime to monitor our activity. There is one time to end this and it is now. MLS’s must stop sharing data with Zillow.
I think that the best way is to go back to the basics, Showing Services are
good, but we can open doors for everybody too.
Thinking on dropping Showing time
Zillow is a wolf in Sheep’s clothing and literally biting the hand that has fed them. I have had agents try to use SHowingTime to show my listings and I call them personally and say I refuse to use SHowingTime because it is like Big Brother Zillow so pick up your phone and text or call me. I will say in my confidential remarks to not used ShowingTime. Reach out to your local MLS board and speak up folks.
The acquisition of Dotloop and Showing Time is just another nail in the coffin for independent brokerages to protect the data of their clients’ information. Has anyone thought one iota of how our clients feel about their data about sale or purchase of their homes makes them feel? This is not just about stealing other brokerages information on their clients. It’s about STEALING information about buyers and sellers who want their information protected. MLS and our leadership has done a grave disservice to not only realtors but our clients also. Zillow via dotloop and ShowingTime now has very private information about every buyer and seller uploaded into those systems.
Iam disappointed in our NAR & local boards who have let Zillow basically work to take over our industry. I refuse to use dot loop & now will sever my use of ShowingTime. I do think however if our industry leaders don’t step up with a national MLS system & establish our own partnerships with showing services, electronic signatures etc. Zillow will eventually take over the real estate industry and real estate agents will be a thing of the past.
I too fired Zillow years ago. The price of “leads” just kept going up and the quality of leads went down. In the beginning 2016, I was paying for leads and the business seemed too good to be true then suddenly my leads dropped off . I found out Zillow had raised the price for the zip code I was paying for and the BIG brokerages took control of that zip code. I feel it is so wrong for our business to be sold to companies like Zillow and we have to BUY back our leads. It is insane!
It’s simple don’t use Showingtime or any other showing service. Field all emails, texts, and calls yourself and sell the home.
Better yet, do not support or use showing time to start with if this is the case. From day one, I never trusted Zillow because they were promoting properties that was ” sold” months or year ago and show it as ” Active” so consumers will call them to inquire about the property. Once you call Zillow they will get the information of the caller and ” I got you ” they have your lead. I have had witnessed this many times with my clients.
How is this NOT a violation of Anti-trust laws? They ARE a Monopoly and that is clear to everyone -even SNL, which recently featured Zillow in a skit, on one of their episodes BECAUSE they are a monopoly that everyone recognizes.
NAR – it’s time for you to go to battle for US. FIGHT FOR OUR INDUSTRY – FOR US!