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I don't consider it evil. When you buy a house, fix it up, and resell it, you're essentially providing a renovation service to whoever will buy it next. There's
by pcwalton 5y ago
I don't consider it evil. When you buy a house, fix it up, and resell it, you're essentially providing a renovation service to whoever will buy it next. There's no meaningful difference between you renovating a house and selling it and an owner-occupant buying the house and renovating it themselves.
In this case, Zillow bought houses too high and sold them too low. As a result, the market punished that irrational behavior.
- 93po 5y agoIf there's no difference then there'd be no profit for Zillow and they wouldn't be doing this to begin with. Clearly there's a difference and it's morally bankrupt
- esyir 5y agoHis argument is that Zillow was providing a valuable service in the renovation process. Value-add allows them to charge for it.
- 93po 5y agoThat would make sense if Zillow employees were literally the people painting the walls. As it is (or was), there's probably a project manager that managed hundreds of houses, spends all day on the phone call painting companies, and then just assumes they do a good job. I'm perfectly capable of calling a painting company myself and don't need to pay Zillow thousands of dollars extra to do it for me.
- esyir 5y agoThe integration of renovation in the sales process is a differentiating factor in itself. That you're not the target market or, that it might not have been successful, doesn't change that.
- UncleEntity 5y agoIsn’t this whole issue based on the fact that there is no profit for Zillow and they are no longer going to be doing this? Half a billion dollar loss seems like a pretty good indication that maybe…