SEATTLE, June 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Zillow today
launches significant upgrades to its Zestimate® home valuation
model. The changes allow the algorithm to react more quickly
to current market trends and improve the national median error rate
to 6.9% -- an improvement of nearly a full percentage point for
more than 104 million off-market homes.
The new Zestimate algorithm leverages neural networks, the
latest machine learning approach, and incorporates deeper history
of property data such as sales transactions, tax assessments and
public records, in addition to home details such as square footage
and location.
Neural networks are artificial intelligence systems that imitate
how the human brain works. They are able to map hundreds of
millions of data points efficiently, drawing connections among
inputs and using the relationships formed to produce or predict an
output. In the case of the Zestimate algorithm, the neural network
model correlates home facts, location, housing market trends and
home values.
As a result of this update, the Zestimate can now react more
quickly to dynamic market conditions, providing homeowners with a
more accurate estimate [prediction] of a home's current value. In
addition, transition to a neural network-based model will reduce
Zestimate processing time.
"Since we introduced the Zestimate in 2006, we have never
stopped innovating in order to provide consumers with the most
accurate home valuations," said Dr. Stan
Humphries, Zillow chief analytics officer and creator of the
Zestimate. "The new architecture we're debuting today represents
another significant step forward in our efforts to harness big data
to create more certainty for consumers, which leads to better
decisions."
Fifteen years ago, the Zestimate gave people instant access for
the first time to an estimated value for millions of homes across
America for free. Over the past decade and a half, Zillow has
released multiple major Zestimate algorithm updates as well as
incremental improvements between major upgrades, and now calculates
valuations for more than 104 million homes across the country.
As a result of the company's increasing confidence in Zestimate
accuracy, in February Zillow began using the Zestimate as a
live, initial cash offer through its home buying program, Zillow
Offers. The Zestimate is an initial cash offer on about 900,000
eligible homes across 23 markets. With this latest update and
increased Zestimate accuracy, the number of homes eligible for a
cash offer will likely increase by 30%.
Applying a neural network model to a national real estate
dataset was an innovation used by the winning team of Zillow Prize,
the two-year, $1 million data science
competition that included more than 3,800 teams from 91 countries
working to improve the Zestimate. One member of the team,
Jordan Meyer is now a senior applied
scientist at Zillow and works on home valuations for Zillow
Offers.
About Zillow Group
Zillow Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: Z and
ZG) is reimagining real estate to make it easier to unlock life's
next chapter.
As the most-visited real estate website in the U.S., Zillow® and
its affiliates offer customers an on-demand experience for selling,
buying, renting or financing with transparency and nearly seamless
end-to-end service. Zillow Offers® buys and sells homes directly in
dozens of markets across the country, allowing sellers control over
their timeline. Zillow Home Loans™, our affiliate lender, provides
our customers with an easy option to get pre-approved and secure
financing for their next home purchase. Zillow recently launched
Zillow Homes, Inc., a licensed brokerage entity, to streamline
Zillow Offers transactions.
Zillow Group's affiliates and subsidiaries include Zillow®,
Zillow Offers®, Zillow Premier Agent®, Zillow Home Loans™, Zillow
Closing Services™, Zillow Homes, Inc., Trulia®, Out East®,
StreetEasy® and HotPads®. Zillow Home Loans, LLC is an Equal
Housing Lender, NMLS #10287 (www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org).
View original content to download
multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/zillow-launches-new-neural-zestimate-yielding-major-accuracy-gains-301312541.html
SOURCE Zillow Group