Zillow Summit

I attended my third Zillow Premier Agent Summit yesterday at the Washington State Convention Center. Zillow has been one of my primary marketing tools, ever since it began the Premier Agent program. I receive both buyer and seller leads from it in my hottest zip code choices. Reviews are critical to my success as a Zillow agent. If you are a faithful reader of this blog, a tenant or client of mine, do me a favor and write a nice review here!

One thing that has always impressed me about the Summits is the accessibility of Zillow's top leadership. Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff always opens the Summits with his overview of the strides that Zillow has been making recently. Zillow is now just one brand of the Zillow Group, the nation's largest real estate online marketplace, with acquisitions of Postlets, Easy Street, Trulia, and most recently Naked Apartments. Zillow has invested heavily in mobile applications, and that has paid off handsomely, as 2/3 of all real estate searches are now made online. Zillow is the number one real estate website both nationally and locally, here in Seattle.

Zillow has also invested in television advertising, and partnerships with other impressive real estate media such as HGTV and Leju, the largest Chinese real estate website. So Zillow's marketing directs a lot of both national and foreign investment to its websites and to its premier agents. Zillow is fueled by leads from numerous national brokerages and over 400 Multiple Listing Services - but surprisingly, not the NWMLS which is located in its own home town.

The Summits provide a lot of opportunity for networking, for learning more about agent tools and resources, for hearing from other brokers, and for getting a Zillow update on the health of the national and local real estate markets.

Zillow's senior economist Dr. Skylar Olsen presented the following stats about the housing market: Nationally, the housing market is within 6.4% of peak housing values; in the three-county Seattle metro area, we are just 3% below the 2007 peak. Housing prices within Seattle proper saw a 13% increase in just the last 12 months. This is a very hot seller's market, with unusually low inventory - and Olsen listed several reasons for this phenomenon. She believes that new construction will help resolve the inventory imbalance, albeit slowly.

At the moment, homeowners in Seattle are spending 22% of their income on mortgage payments, while renters are spending 32% of their income on rent. One could argue that mortgages are more affordable than they have been for many years (but I am not convinced). 22% of all first-time homebuyers are using gifts of funds to come up with the necessary down payment to purchase a home. And lower-income, working class households are willing to live further out in an effort to find housing affordability. In Seattle, this may mean living over 20 miles from their job locations for 21% of all local commuters!

The median home price in Seattle now stands around $530,000.

According to Olsen, some of the best "buyers markets" in the Puget Sound are in locations like Spanaway, Orting, Puyallup and Gig Harbor.

Savvy real estate investors will want to pay attention to these trends. Thank you, Zillow, for sponsoring yesterday's Summit!

Happy Investing!

Zillow Summit

Here I am with Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff at today's Zillow Summit for Premier Real Estate Agents in Bellevue. We shared lunch together at a Showcase table of other premier agents and Zillow staff, discussing everything from Rascoff's trajectory as an entrepreneur to current issues and future directions for Zillow.

Zillow is a "living database" of 110 million homes in the United States, and the premier real estate website in the country. 2/3 of Zillow users access information on real estate via their mobile devices. Premier agents like myself have access to a whole host of Zillow tools and resources to grow our business and better serve our customer base.

Today's presentation included quite a bit of local market information. The bottom of the housing market here was in late 2011, but the 2013 comeback in hard-hit markets was truly spectacular, showing 20-30% price appreciation in some markets. In the Seattle metro area, prices were up around 10% and in some markets getting close to peak values. Yet inventory is down 63% from 2010.

Best local buyers markets are in places like Sumner, Gig Harbor, Burien, Lakewood and University Place. Best seller markets in Kirkland, Issaquah, Seattle and Redmond. Zillow forecasters predict a 5% increase in home values in the coming year for the Seattle metro area. Additional metrics can be found at www.zillow.com/research

Great tools here for agents and investors alike!

Happy Investing!

Zillow Summit in Seattle

I attended and really enjoyed the Zillow Summit in Seattle yesterday. Here are my notes from that event:

Spencer Rascoff, CEO:
Zillow has two key focus areas: to improve software tools for real estate agents; and to grow consumer audience via advertising and partnerships

Mobile audience has grown 6X in the last two years. Largest mobile audience for homes. Largest real estate website in Seattle and virtually all 100 top cities in US.

Street Easy in NY was acquired for $50M, and is now #1 website in NY.

Partnership with Google and Apple launched recently. Many partnerships and acquisitions to grow Zillow as the #1 real estate website.

Zillow does not have an international presence, just in the US for now.

Second largest competitor is Trulia, but what distinguishes Zillow is that there is information on EVERY home, whether listed or not.

Listing leads are generated through Zillow for premier agents when homeowners are looking up the value of their homes.

Market Leader and Top Producer are the products sold by Zillow's key competitors.

Zillow acquired Hot Pads for $20M about a year ago; has significant rental leads. This makes Zillow more relevant to property managers.

Zillow also owns Postlets, but still has some challenges in dealing with Craigslist (which has recently disallowed html links).

Clear trend: ascension of the agent team. Internet has changed expectations of customer service.

Another major trend is the use of mobile device.

More aspects of the transaction will be automated. Yet there will also be human interaction in the real estate transaction.

As a professional, you are there to interpret what people see on the internet (such as Zestimates).

"Zillow special offers" includes special offers to buyer that gets many more views. Not as relevant in current market.

Agent panel: Kevin from Seattle since 2005; Matt - Remax on the Lake 5years; Gordon, 24 years; Geordy Roemer broker for 10 years.

Much discussion on how Zestimates are derived, and how to talk with clients about this.

Claim your own home on Zillow to make the Zestimate even more accurate.

How fast to respond? Get back to the contact ASAP is best practice; but also need to train clients that you are not available all the time.

Set up phones to send quick text back, auto-respond. Also auto-responder email when contacts come in.

Agents can respond to reviews, and use the response as a way to brand your self.

Get consumer information quickly on your own leads; come prepared with other listings to show a buyer; many agents just go out to show houses without requiring pre-approval-don't want to be pushed, don't want to be sold, just go ahead and show

Best practices for conversion rates - three emails that go out within the first week, pointing out resources, reviews about agents, send other listings. Response time and trying to speak to a live person on the phone.

Svenja Gudjel, economist with Zillow. Zillow home value index shows that national home values are back to the Oct 2004 levels. Home value appreciation rates are up 15.2% over the previous year in Seattle.

Month over month appreciation is slowing down a bit now, most everywhere around the country after a year of rapid appreciation.

Rates may creep up to 5% by the end of 2014. Seattle metro is up 15.2%, blessed with good job growth and lower unemployment rates, doing much better than the nation as a whole.

Median home price of Seattle homes $429300 in September 2013. Very close to peak value, within 7-8% of peak value.

% of homes in negative equity: Seattle 17.4%, Everett 36%, Tacoma 39.6%, Bellevue 10.1%, Renton 28.3%. Steadily working the percentage of negative equity down.

First time homebuyers had the toughest time competing with investors for tight inventory in areas with the greatest negative equity.

18% of monthly income on home mortgages. Historically, homeowners in Seattle used to spend 25% of monthly income on mortgage. But if rate goes up to 6%, that percentage goes up that high - bubble territory.

Home values are beginning to level out, expect returns in Seattle of 6.7% for 2014.
Greatest appreciation forecast for Everett, Bellevue and Renton (areas still w negative equity).

Basics of valuing homes: physical attributes, tax assessments and prior home sales.

agentfolio allows folks to share listings with clients, and collects information all in one place. Helps with the communication, and can add agent team members. agentfolio.com to sign up free, live with NWMLS. Sign in with your Zillow account.

Use free software and tools provided by Zillow. Full mobile apps, ipad, etc.

Vision for pro tools going forward. Helping to get and convert contacts and get repeat business.

For help deciphering my notes, or for more detail, please leave a comment or message me at HomeLandInvestment@gmail.com

Happy investing!