How YipitData’s Zillow Projections Beat Consensus by 20pp in 3Q 2021
Background
In 2019, Zillow Group began a national rollout of its iBuying arm, Zillow Offers. The unparalleled depth and granularity of our real estate coverage led us to a bold yet unpopular analysis in Q3 2021 that would prove highly accurate.
The Questions
Is Zillow going to meet its Zillow Offers revenue guidance?
Did the company misprice homes, skewing its outlook for profitability?
Analyzing billions of data points every day, YipitData was able to provide highly accurate, detailed insights driving smart, forward-looking investment strategies.
The Answers
In early September 2021, our Zillow team preliminarily projected that Zillow Offers would miss consensus and the low end of guidance by a wide margin. Our initial call was highly debated among investors, given (1) ZG had never missed the high-end of Zillow Offers guidance (prior to 3Q21) and (2) competitors/sell-side analysts were not seeing the same trends in their data. Amid this skepticism around our call for a miss, Zillow announced in mid-October that it would pause new offers and ultimately announced its exit from iBuying during 3Q21 earnings in early November. Our final 3Q estimate (published late October) correctly called the wide consensus/guidance miss.
In addition to estimating 3Q 2021 Zillow Offers revenue, homes sold, and homes bought accurately, our analyses correctly indicated that Zillow mispriced homes and implied a weaker outlook for profitability.
We were overall 20pp more accurate than consensus on Zillow Offers revenue, 27pp more accurate on homes sold, and 49pp more accurate on homes bought.
Homes Segment Earnings Recap chart here:
The Results
We were able to detect that Zillow rapidly expanded its iBuying business by purchasing more homes, but did not sell enough to meet its guidance. We showed that Zillow mispriced homes implying a weaker outlook for profitability in the future.
Our 3Q Homes KPI accuracy, which identified this significant miss in revenue/homes sold, helped our clients make better investment decisions.
Our clients were prepared for Zillow’s 3Q 2021 earnings report on November 2, with the stock down 23% the day following the print, and down 30% when measured from the day before the company announced it would be pausing Offers purchases on 10/18
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