NYC agents can stay up to date on details about StreetEasy’s listing access standards here.

By Caroline Burton, StreetEasy Vice President and General Manager

At Zillow and StreetEasy, our mission is to make buying, selling, and renting a home easier for everyone. That means helping consumers access all available listings — without barriers, bias or backroom deals. It also means creating a more transparent, fair and efficient marketplace for agents and brokers.

It’s why we’ve established listing access standards. At the core of these standards is one simple principle: A listing marketed to some buyers should be marketed to all buyers.

This means when a listing is publicly marketed, it must be submitted to StreetEasy within one business day of public marketing. 

StreetEasy’s listing access standards go into effect June 30. Our goal is to give agents ample time to understand our standards to ensure they maintain access to StreetEasy programs that connect them to the widest audience of NYC home shoppers. For most agents and teams, nothing changes. They, like us, are committed to doing the right thing for their sellers and buyers.

How We Will Uphold Listing Access on StreetEasy

NYC agents and teams who choose to publicly market listings to some buyers but not all buyers will lose access to programs including StreetEasy Experts, StreetEasy Concierge and Zillow Premier Agent in NYC and will not have access to new listing and agent marketing tools StreetEasy is rolling out soon. Additionally, NYC listings that do not comply with Zillow’s listing access standards will not be published on Zillow or Trulia for the life of the listing agreement between that listing broker and seller.

Publicly marketing that exclusive listings are available if a buyer is willing to work with a specific agent or brokerage is not compliant with the standards. When real estate listings are hidden from some consumers, it creates an uneven playing field. This lack of transparency can erode trust in the real estate market, where buyers are not given a fair chance to explore all their options and could miss out on their ideal home simply because the listing agent is selectively sharing the listing. Sellers also lose out on the best possible offers due to a reduced pool of potential buyers. Studies show this often results in less competitive prices for sellers, fewer choices for buyers, and limits everyone’s ability to make informed decisions. In NYC, nearly all sellers agree that their home is more likely to sell quickly (94%) and that they are more likely to get the price they want for their home (93%) if more prospective buyers can view it.

Buyers, and sellers trust StreetEasy for our transparent approach and we will continue to promote competition and fair access to inventory for all. This is why we’re implementing standards on StreetEasy in addition to the Zillow listing access standards which apply to Zillow and Trulia. Everyone deserves a fair shot at finding their next home.

The Problem With Pick-and-Choose Access

Listings shouldn’t be used as leverage to control who gets to participate in the home-buying process. It’s a bait-and-switch move, where agents or brokerages try to get the best of both worlds — dangling a listing to gain more business, only to turn around and market it widely later. 

On the rare occasion a seller has a legitimate reason to keep their listing fully private — whether for privacy, safety or another personal reason — we support that. In those cases, the listing, at the seller’s request, never gets publicly marketed (on Zillow, StreetEasy or anywhere else online). It’s the exception, not the norm. And if a seller does require privacy, they should be presented with a disclosure clearly outlining that they could be trading sales price and time to sell for privacy. Ultimately, when a listing is made public to anyone, it should be accessible to everyone. Anything less than this creates an uneven playing field. 

We will share more details about implementation of these standards for StreetEasy before they go into effect in June. 

Brokerages and Agents Committed to Transparency Unlock New StreetEasy Tools & Data 

Brokerages and their agents committing to transparency will soon unlock new offerings from StreetEasy. Powered by StreetEasy’s real-time data on buyer demand, these new tools will help their agents win business and market their listings in new ways, while maintaining maximum exposure on behalf of their clients to the widest audience of buyers in NYC across Zillow Group brands.

Our Commitment: Consumers Come First

Zillow and StreetEasy were founded on the principle of free and fair access to real estate information and listings and we have not wavered in that commitment. When we empower consumers, we’re also supporting great agents in building and scaling their businesses. Agents cannot do their best work when they are unable to compete freely and fairly. They should earn business based on the value they offer, not because they are members of a private listing club.