In case you missed it, Mike DelPrete put up an interesting post about Zillow’s foray into rulemaking and rule enforcement with some interesting examples. Check out the entire thing here.
DelPrete believes that this is Zillow going hard against Compass, because “Over the preceding nine months, Compass has demonstrated the power of disciplined focus and strong execution, and now Zillow is countering with its own “maximum effort.””
One such effort is that Zillow isn’t banning a listing for being publicly marketed for more than one day before it appears on Zillow. Zillow is banning all private listings from a company that markets the fact of private listings existing:
First up: Zillow has clarified its definition of public marketing to include any buyer-oriented marketing that private listings exist.
This is broad treatment: it’s not just a specific listing being marketed publicly (yard sign, social media post, email) that is in violation, but the mere existence of a private listing.
So, in the case of Compass, simply advertising that there are private listings on its search results page means all of those listings are in violation and subject to a potential Zillow ban.
He notes that this maximum effort means more than just some blogposts and podcast appearances and issuing policy language:
Setting policy and issuing statements will only get you so far – to be truly effective, Zillow needs to reach out to every single agent that is in violation of its policy.
To change behavior, agents need to hear the consequences of listing privately directly from Zillow, not their own brokerage.
To that end, Zillow has begun calling agents with a listing in violation of its policy – example below.
Zillow then follows up with an email that outlines its policies and clarifies that after June 30, non-compliant listings will be banned from Zillow for the life of the listing agreement.
DelPrete seems supportive of Zillow’s enforcement here, saying “there are no half-measures nor compromises; if Zillow believes in something, it’s all in.” My good friend James Dwiggins, who is definitely pro-Zillow and anti-Compass on this issue, echoes the support over on LinkedIn:
What neither has considered, however, is whether Zillow’s enforcement actions here do or do not violate Article 16 of the NAR Code of Ethics. I wonder if Zillow has considered that.
As everyone in the industry knows, Zillow is not only a portal, it is a licensed brokerage. Not only that, Zillow is a dues-paying REALTOR and all of its “managing brokers” and “agents” are also dues-paying REALTORS. All of them have sworn to uphold the Code of Ethics. Both the brokerage license and the REALTOR status are necessary for Zillow to get access to the MLS and the data feeds: IDX, VOW, and others.
There have been efforts in the past—and even into the present—by various brokers and MLSs to somehow differentiate Zillow from a normal brokerage. The whole “endeavor to cooperate” thing is one such effort. All of them have failed because Zillow insists on being treated like a normal REALTOR member of the MLS.
So let’s go down that path. Once again, none of this is legal advice and I am not your lawyer.
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