Comments on: Nonprofit alleges Zillow estimates are inaccurate

In FTC complaint, group claims site's real-estate valuations are misleading consumers.

[botte777]

nonprofits are stupid in this arena

Just because ppl use it doesn't mean they should rely on it for 100% accuracy. As they said, it's a STARTING POINT.

I looked our house up months ago as well as it today & it's right in line with our property valuation as well as taxes.

Do I use KBB.com for car values? Sure. Do I use that value as the end-all be-all? Hell no.

[Acesh]

Zillow is not even close. When you have a condo unit listed as worth 133K and the one next door to it worth 28K, there is a problem. In fact , on Realtor.com the specific condo units .. the highest listed now is 98K. Then our own home, which is a single family home, they've confused the larger and smaller two stories and went with the lesser value. Aren't we taxed on the square footage of our homes? All properties i mention here are in good shape.. but guess the fact that it's Michigan and some one decided to strip the value of our homes while other states do so much better. If folks use zillow for their comparables, it will be a long long time, if ever that we recover.

[Kris Linna]

For my house, Zillow is waaay off.

6 months ago and today, Zillow doens't even come close to
properly estimating my house. In fact, it shows my next door
neighbor's house as being worth more, when it is on a much
smaller piece of property and their house as fewer square feet.

Zillow doesn't show that we have been continually making
improvements to our house, while our neighbor's house hasn't
seen even a fresh gallon of paint in 20 years.

When we use Zillow to add in the improvements we've made,
which are many, the value of our house goes up by over 40%. Of
course, that value is only visible to me, if YOU look it will still
show the original, pre-improvment value.

Not to mention that local realtors have given us higher estimates
than Zillow does and they don't see the inside of the house
either.

I think Zillow is interesting to play with but that's about all.
Nobody should be using it for actual valuation. Knowing that
the value of our house is grossly underestimated, how can I trust
the values it gives me for other properties.

[wonky27]

huh?

is that true? why wouldn't the updated info you entered into Zillow also update the value of your house that is visible to everyone?