Zillow’s costly foray into the competitive iBuying category is meant to make money from transaction fees, not, as many believe, from home price appreciation. To date, Zillow has lost money on every iBuying transaction, but those loses are becoming smaller.
Rich Barton, the CEO of Zillow said, “We’re not flipping this property. We’re not trying to get an artificially low price… We’re not looking to hold it... We’re looking to move it as quickly as possible and earn our money on the transaction fee.”