The Village View

Thursday, February 09, 2006

Zillow: I thought it was cool

I read about Zillow demoing at Demo 2006 and immediately checked it out. Since I'm not a homeowner, I checked out the house I grew up in (i.e. my folks' house). My first reaction was, "friggin cool."

I sent the link to my sister and mom, both realtors. They had somewhat different reactions:
"I just don't see how it can even be remotely accurate without taking
upgrades, condition of house, materials, floorplan, etc. in to account.
These types of sites are dangerous b/c everyone thinks they are an expert
when they are really clueless. (hint hint)" - this is from my sister and the "hint, hint" I believe is directed at me. My mom had similar reactions.

While I don't disagree with them, I think some of the reaction is defensive. This could be a threat to realtors. I also think it could end up being a pain in the ass for them (see my sister's comments above). It's analogous to what has happened to doctors with prescription medicine commercials; everybody comes in and "knows" what they need.

Finally, Nick Carr had an interesting take on it. Thought he raised a relevant potential issue:
The danger is that if users keep coming up against unreliable data they could end up rebelling against the entire Web 2.0 model.

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