Zillow now charging for Rental Listings

Realtor · Cleveland, OH · Member since 2015 · 2k+ posts · 857 votes

Zillow now charing $9.99/wk for a rental listing. Greedy scum since they didn't turn profit this quarter. They say you IF you don't get any leads after a week it's free....but I know if its any leads like you get as a Real Estate Agent I'd rather take a bullet to my head as they are not quality at all

What other sites are landlords using that are FREE?
Craigslist?

Hotpads and Trulia are owned by Zillow so no getting around that.

Just seeing what other landlords are doing to work around this. OR if they have noticed their PM up charging them now for advertising on these websites?

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Karl B.

Rental Property Investor · Erie, PA · Member since 2015 · 1k+ posts · 2k+ votes

Facebook is by far my best source. There's likely a Cleveland, Ohio rental group on Facebook (assuming that's your local market). Join it and post your listings there for free. I would venture to guess 75% of my vacancies have been filled thanks to Facebook and now that number will rise as I'm not paying Zillow or any other site for that matter (mainly because Facebook is superior and free).

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Jill F.
Investor · Akron, OH · Member since 2016 · 2k+ posts · 4k+ votes
6y
My very best tenants that I've ever placed came from ... Craigslist

Though I have gotten great tenants from zillow, apartments.com, and trulia as well. I got a huge response the couple of times that I posted on fb but I dont think I actually got a tenant from the FB advertisement; but I usually get multiple qualified applicants so perhaps they just weren't "first in line". My last apartment without zillow didn't get as large a response as usual but I was closer to actual market value rather than below like I usually am so it's hard to know. I think moving forward, I'll try to do better nailing the market price and then advertise to the free sites first and if I don't get a qualified applicant in 7-10 days I'll drop my price and add zillow.

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Greg M.
Rental Property Investor · Los Angeles, CA · Member since 2017 · 2k+ posts · 5k+ votes
6y
Originally posted by @Federico Gutierrez:

Oh boo hoo. You want to talk about a group of people who ripped off others for years - real estate agents. Taking 6% of the sale price of something that sells for hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars. Zillow isn't the enemy, the greed of real estate agents is the enemy. Your business model is dying.
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Don SpaffordPro Member
Investor · Idaho Falls, ID · Member since 2016 · 935 posts · 629 votes
6y
I usually can get a place rented in less than a week after placing an ad anyway so I would probably never need to pay more than one week so a $10 marketing expense is pretty cheap in my opinion.
1 Reply
Karah Collins
Member since 2020 · 25 posts · 25 votes
6y
Do any of you using FB Marketplace have any apprehension about potential future tenants being able to contact you via social media?
I know that some landlords here prefer to remain anonymous and go strictly through a PM. Even if one plans to self manage, the ability of tenants to easily contact me on social media brings me a bit of anxiety.
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Judy Parker
Rental Property Investor · Closter, NJ · Member since 2015 · 884 posts · 722 votes
6y
@Federico Gutierrez If you are a Realtor, why not just list on your MLS, which then forwards to all the syndicators (Zillow, Trulia, Apartments.com, HotPads etc). Further, here in NJ the Tenant pays the Realtor fee, so I get paid a commission for renting my own properties.
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Federico Gutierrez
OP
Realtor · Cleveland, OH · Member since 2015 · 2k+ posts · 857 votes
6y
Originally posted by @Greg M.:
Originally posted by @Federico Gutierrez:

Oh boo hoo. You want to talk about a group of people who ripped off others for years - real estate agents. Taking 6% of the sale price of something that sells for hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars. Zillow isn't the enemy, the greed of real estate agents is the enemy. Your business model is dying.

Who hurt you? That's a nice rant but not the point of the thread.
So far I've had a lot of interest in FB market place. I got some other units coming so I'll do a bit of testing on CL and see if I get as many hits
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James MaraditsPro Member
Real Estate Broker · Cleveland, OH · Member since 2015 · 239 posts · 224 votes
6y
I'll happily pay $10 to not have to deal with Facebook or Craiglist tire kickers. Last month I listed a unit on Facebook and Zillow. I got literally over 100 "Is this still available" messages on Facebook, probably 90% of which never responded to my response. I received 8 or 9 qualified applications from Zillow in the first day on market with minimal back and forth. Zillow's built in application and screening features are super helpful and allow the tenant to pay a one time fee that they can use for 30 days on any property on the site, which I believe tends to inspire them to utilize the feature rather than paying the fee for multiple properties like they would be doing elsewhere.
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Joni Chin
Investor · Honolulu, HI · Member since 2017 · 45 posts · 20 votes
6y
@Federico Gutierrez
Zillow is still free in my areas but if they charged $10 a week I would still use it. I’ve only used Craigslist and Zillow but I’ve found that I get better quality of applicants and the response is far less full of scammers and tire kickers than craigslist. I haven’t had to advertise for longer than 1 week on Zillow, and I really like the applications feature too.
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Jim Spatzenfeld
Investor · NorCal · Member since 2015 · 282 posts · 240 votes
6y
I used to pay like $40-$50 for newspaper ads 20 years ago, and for the last 15+ years, I paid zero on Zillow and Craigslist. To get a tenant for 10 bucks is not a bad deal.
3 Reply
Rennie Ashby
Member since 2020 · 5 posts · 1 vote
6y
Anybody have any experience using Zumper.com? Think it's free.
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Zach Backes
Investor · Missoula, MT · Member since 2020 · 2 posts · 1 vote
6y
@Ned Carey Yep, they’re just capitalists making money on a platform they’ve spent millions to build.
1 Reply
Roy Nash
Rental Property Investor · Spokane, WA · Member since 2018 · 64 posts · 59 votes
6y
Last opening I used Facebook and Zillow. Both platforms delivered more prospects than I could even answer. The one I chose came from Zillow on day 1. What I did like about Facebook is being able to look at their Facebook Profile to see what type of background I might be dealing with. What I liked about Zillow was the built in application /screening feature. Many people were sending me prescreens before I even asked for them. It would have cost me $10 to rent the place. Nothing really and well worth it. I will list with FB and Zillow again next time.
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JD MartinBusiness Member
Moderator
Rock Star Extraordinaire · Northeast, TN · Member since 2015 · 10k+ posts · 16k+ votes
6y
My best responses and ultimate tenants on my properties have come from either Zillow or Trulia. Craiglist is a wasteland; I quit advertising there 3 or 4 years ago. The quality of inquiries was terrible, with most of them looking for some great bargain, completely unqualified or not even seriously looking. Zillow and Trulia was nice when it was free, but my last two times I've had to list and pay it only cost me 10 bucks as my field of applicants was thick and qualified. I also started using their application process, which doesn't supplant mine but does streamline it, and Zillow's credit app service isn't that much difference from Transunion, which saves me a step in the process. We also use Apartments.com but have had little luck in that all of our properties are SFHs and that demographic is geared differently.
It's not perfect but it's the best of all alternatives I've found so far.
Podcast Guest on Show #243
Skyline Properties
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Frankie Renaldi
Member since 2020 · 21 posts · 8 votes
6y
@Federico Gutierrez Zillow has been taking our free data and selling points of interest back to us for so long and its soooooooo freaking frustrating. Then they use our money as realtors and now investors to bump us out of a deal all together with their purchase program. It’s insane that we fund this madness. It would be amazing to have a countrywide boycott for an entire quarter and see how bad it hurts them. I can live without the 10 leads a month, but can they afford to lose that entire revenue stream across the country? Who knows. Just venting.
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Frankie Renaldi
Member since 2020 · 21 posts · 8 votes
6y
@Joseph ODonovan if we are for profit companies as investors why do we give them OUR data for free? We give them their only bait to put on the hook and we do it for free so they can charge us....genius business model, but I’m done playing that game. They can tank because of their greed and I’ll be sipping some scotch and smiling. No data = no traffic = no revenue. Time to fight back unless they want to pay us for our data 🤷🏻‍♂️
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Joseph ODonovanPro Member
Property Manager · Ridley, PA · Member since 2017 · 427 posts · 449 votes
6y
@Frankie Renaldi You can frown on Zillow's business model all you want but the fact is Zillow invested millions of $$ into their platform and shouldered all the risk with the hope of making it profitable. It's called capitalism. Zillow and other technology driven companies will eventually turn the Real Estate Agent into a dinosaur. So you can fight back and not use Zillow but the cat is already out of the bag. I would suggest buying a few shares of Zillow stock and enjoy their ride.
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Frankie Renaldi
Member since 2020 · 21 posts · 8 votes
6y
Hey Joseph I am all for Capitalism in every sense of the term and I'm not ******** on their model I actually called it a GENIUS business model (not sure if you missed that in my response or not), what im saying is im done with funding their platform and giving them my data for free so they can charge me. I do roughly 100-120 deals a year as a realtor (maybe 5-8 of them zillow leads) and I have purchased 5 buildings in the last 18 months as an investor and successfully rented them without zillow. All im saying is you do not need to be up Zillows *** to be successful. As for me, im turning the faucet off. Im not delusional that my 1200/month I spend with them is going to make a difference in their bottom line, but when enough people are fed up with them (which a large number are) it will make a difference. I will say it again...I think their model is freakin genius...im just not going to fund it after giving them my data for free.
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Billy Smith
Shawnee Mission, KS · Member since 2016 · 719 posts · 313 votes
6y
I used Zillow last 3 times the S.F.H rented in 2 hours to most 2 days .Now could I have used some other site sure but why .The quality of people is the same from other sites .The homes are "A" so not too hard to rent them .
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Michael Heisterkamp
Member since 2020 · 122 posts · 62 votes
6y
So a company that provides you with a service is greedy? I would argue that you are the greedy one in this case. You expect the labor and network of others to be rendered to you for free. What would your response be if someone said "While living at home with my parents I got free rent, therefore I should get free rent while I live in your property". While not the same example in essence that is what you are saying.
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Joe SplitrockPro Member
Moderator
Rental Property Investor · Sioux Falls, SD · Member since 2015 · 9k+ posts · 18k+ votes
6y
@Federico Gutierrez this is not new. They have been rolling out pay per listing in various markets for over a year. My market is still free.
Craigslist has become worthless and overrun with spam in most markets. The reason it failed is because it was free. No money to keep the quality up on the system.
Every business has to monetize to make money and there are two ways to do it. You can sell advertising or charge for a service.
Just be aware that Zillow is free for renters, so although you are outraged, your potential customers are still happily using Zillow to search for rentals. If you choose not to list there, it only helps your competition.
I think you are looking at your business wrong. If you have a house that rents for $1500 per month, that works out to $50 per day of vacancy in lost rents. That is $350 a week. Compare that to Zillow charging $10 a week. If you could rent the property one day earlier, you are saving $40. Look more at the benefit instead of cost.
If you can list for free other places and get the same results, then no reason to pay for Zillow. Just be careful, Zillow is the dominant listing site in many markets - especially the ones they are charging, which is why they are doing it.
Also for some perspective, when I started in this business in 2003, the newspaper was the dominant source for leads. They charged $15 a week for two lines of text! Then and today, we still get more interest from yard signs than any advertising medium. Beyond yard signs, you can use Facebook and Apartments.com for free.
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John Teachout
Rental Property Investor · Concord, GA · Member since 2015 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votes
6y
I think there's a mistaken assumption here that Facebook has one group of "shoppers", Craigslist has another group, Zillow has yet another group and so forth. In my experience, people look at ALL of the sites when they're looking for a rental. So assuming you're going to get quality people from one place and junk from another does not reflect my experience. All the sites are full of tire kickers and people will respond to a dozen properties at a time. Finding a quality tenant is the absolute most important task of a landlord and it's a lot of work sifting through the masses but it must be done. I will typically receive 100 to 200 inquiries during the 1.5 to 2.0 week period that it usually takes me to place a tenant. Getting 400 isn't necessarily better, especially when it's discovered how many inquiries are the same person.

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Steve Babiak
Real Estate Investor · Audubon, PA · Member since 2009 · 13k+ posts · 8k+ votes
6y
Nobody has yet mentioned TurboTenant - try them for rental ads. They post your ad to lots of sites where tenants look. I haven’t done an ad with them since Zillow started charging, but they used to post to the Zillow network too in the past.
And the founder of TurboTenant is a BP member too. His profile is in link below. Maybe he can tell us if he gets onto Zillow still and whether there is any fee for that.
https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/Sarnen
1 Reply
Pamela Mathews
Member since 2021 · 1 post · 1 vote
5y
Get your listing on realtor.com by using their landlord portal avail.co Its all free and realtor.com has a ton more rental listings than zillow. It is now the go-to place for single family home rental searches.
1 Reply
Sami Gren
Rental Property Investor · NJ · Member since 2019 · 442 posts · 40 votes
5y
Originally posted by @Brian Garlington:
Zillow is trash. The potential renters don’t even read the ads..... they just look at the phone number and price then call.

Zillow the website is also hot garbage as far as rentals. Last two times we placed ads on GoSection 8.... Zillow duplicated the ad and put it on their website to get more traffic.... people were calling us and we told them we didn’t even advertise on Zillow.

is go section 8 a site to post section 8 tenants/

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Brian Garlington
Realtor · Oakland, CA and a Real Estate Investor with Multi-Family Units and a Self Storage Facility · Member since 2016 · 2k+ posts · 2k+ votes
5y
Absolutely
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