Zillow is good in many states, however some states, like Montana where I live are Non Disclosure states — meaning home, property commercial business sales prices are private and it is illegal for any bank, brokerage, RE agent, appraiser, title company or state or county treasurer to disclose sales pricing.
Zillow does not join the MLS so they have to guess at values for home prices.
Example:
My neighbors put their home on the market for $875,000. Realtor.com had the listing published as did Zillow both for the listing price — $875,000.
The house sold (my neighbor told me personally so I can share) quickly for $950,000.
It will take a few years before Realtor.com to estimate a value on the home on their website due to the non disclosure rules.
After the sale Zillow estimated it’s value at $30% less than the sales price...
I do want to emphasize that I’m not anti Zillow...just some places it’s less accurate.
Counties should not be allowed access to MLS.
Zillow has an old description of my house in their site. We added about 500 sq feet to the kitchen and created an addition where the old porch used to be.
Boy, are they going to be surprised when the house sells for 20% higher than they project it will.
Probably sold to some Californian moving north. My daughter in Missoula can’t afford to buy there.
> state or county treasurer
They have no business accessing actual sale prices unless/until they hold assessments to last sold price. Why do they need sales when they are supposed to make an objective appraisal on the property as it sits? Seems like they can screw you two different ways and they should only be able to do it one way if at all.