Zillow has fired its first shot at limiting private exclusive listings from real estate companies and will begin removing them from Zillow and Trulia after June 30, 2025.
How will sellers react when they find out their home is not being marketed on the busiest real estate website in the world?
Off-MLS Listings: A business Strategy or Compliance Risk? What Real Estate Professionals Need To Know
As the deadline for compliance with Zillow’s new Listing Access Standards draws near, Zillow is starting to call agents to let them know their listing does not meet the standard as of June 30, 2025.
Zillow’s standard is this; “If a listing is marketed to some buyers, it should be marketed to all buyers.”
Beginning on May 28, 2025, agents began receiving messages like this one from Zillow, alerting them to the fact that their listing is not compliant with Zillow’s terms of service.
Zillow will be blocking listings from the site on June 30, 2025. From that point, an agent’s third non-compliant listing – and any subsequent non-compliant listings – will be blocked from Zillow and Trulia for the life of the listing agreement between that broker and seller.
Portal Wars: Zillow vs Homes.com
This is Zillow’s first move in the battle over private exclusive listings, and it will affect the nation’s largest brokerages and potentially thousands of listings.
On a recent search on Compass, over 6,900 exclusive listings were found on Compass’ website (not targeting them but using them for an example). All those listings would be banned from Zillow in this case.
According to Zillow, office exclusives are permitted as long as the homeowner signs a seller disclosure, and the exclusive is limited within a single brokerage company and shared only amongst agents within that brokerage or 1:1 communication with clients (meaning those that have signed an agency agreement with the company).
Also, coming soon listings must be entered into the MLS within one business day and made available to all MLS participants and available via IDX or VOW (these systems are how your real estate agent has all of the MLS listings on their website).
What is not allowed under the Zillow listing access standards
- Listings that are publicly marketed but not entered into the MLS and available via IDX or VOW within one business day of being marketed.
- Listings that are shared selectively with buyers who are not already clients of the brokerage, creating an unfair advantage and limiting access for others.
- Listings marketed to consumers on a public-facing platform including on a brokerage’s website without being entered into the MLS.
- Publicly marketing that off-MLS listings are available if a buyer is willing to work with an agent or brokerage.
- Public marketing includes things like display on a broker’s website, a yard sign promoting the home, open houses or virtual tours.
- A social media post sharing a listing is considered public marketing – and would not be in compliance with our standards – if the post includes things like the following:
- Call to action around selective marketing of the listing.
- Example: A social media post of 123 Main Street with a link to visit the brokerage site, which is gated behind a customer log-in.
- Listing details which could approximate a listing with an accompanying call to action.
- Example: A social media post of 123 Main Street for $500,0000
- Call to action around selective marketing of the listing.
For real estate professionals: Here is a link to Zillow’s Listing Access Standards and an FAQ
Stay tuned as this is the first shot fired from Zillow, and it will be interesting to see how the industry reacts.