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Zillow.com said it is laying off 40 workers, about 25 percent of its staff, to weather the "economic storm."
The Seattle-based Web site provides consumers with estimates of their home's value based on market trends and sales.
"This was an incredibly painful decision for me and the leadership team, but, in the end, we concluded that we had no choice but to securely batten down the hatches as we sail into a major economic storm," said Zillow chief executive Rich Barton on the company's blog.
The staff reductions are effective Tuesday. Laid off workers will receive severance packages.
The housing industry has seen sales and prices fall steeply as mortgage money becomes increasingly hard to find. Some major banks and financial houses collapsed under the weight of subprime mortgage loans in recent weeks sending financial markets into a panic and prompting Congress to enact a $700 billion bailout bill.
COMMENTS:
They will be bought out before they ever go under.
Remember claims that online storefronts would cause classic retailers to close their brick and mortar operations? Now we have an expanded Nordstrom in T-town, so much for that.
I suspect their lack of accurate pricing will catch up to them with them sooner rather than later. You can be assured someone right now is working on a better product right now and online commerce will continue its evolution.
Brick and mortar storefronts will always have a presence but they do need and online space as well or they are losing out on millions of visitors. Retailers like Nordstrom will always do well offline since most people will always prefer to try items on in store.
Trulia.com is actually doing quite well and still looking to hire during these times.
How will their lack of accurate pricing catch up with them? Everyone knows they are just starting points for determining a value. Obviously a real estate appraiser is still needed. (I will say they are almost dead on with the value of my home when looking a the recent comps)
Amazon and Zillow have COMPLETELY different business models that really can't be compared. Think about how much overhead Amazon and employees it takes to run such a company. They have over 17k+ employees, buildings and warehouses spread across the US, Europe and Asia.
You can ask the exact same questions about Amazon. What does Amazon offer that is so unique? What can Amazon offer that I can't find in other places? You can find the exact same things from a gazillion other retail places online AND offline ... Walmart, BestBuy, Barnes & Noble, etc. etc...
MANY experts and analysts expected Amazon to fail as well.
Zillow has a HUGE early advantage like Amazon did with it's business back in '95. You have to remember that Zillow has only been around 3-yrs. It took Amazon over 7-yrs before it even saw it's first net profitable qtr (and that is after bleeding A LOT of cash)
Zillow only has 105 employees, yet already has a major brand that everyone knows and TONS of eye balls in a HUGE financial industry. Again, this isn't about selling physical products like Amazon -- it's about selling leads to brokers/banks and generating ad revenue on their site.
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