According to HousingWire, StreetEasy, which is owned by Zillow, has begun enforcing a new Listings Quality Policy that requires agents to publish listings on the platform on the same day they start publicly marketing a property. If an agent has three violations of this policy, they face removal from StreetEasy entirely and lose access to all of Zillow's portals going forward. Agents who violate the policy also become ineligible for StreetEasy Experts, a lead generation tool that connects buyers searching on StreetEasy with participating agents.
The policy update is happening amid a significant conflict between StreetEasy and Compass International Holdings, a major New York City brokerage that has been keeping listings off StreetEasy as part of what it calls a standard marketing strategy. In early August, Compass pulled its inventory from StreetEasy, arguing that doing so in the slowest month gives sellers exposure to all agents and consumers through the Real Estate Board of New York's Residential Listing Service while temporarily reducing public visibility. Compass leaders have since posted on social media promoting that consumers can find thousands of homes for sale on their website that are not visible on StreetEasy.
StreetEasy also recently implemented changes to its Experts program, including a twenty percent participation cap. Under this cap, if one brokerage represents more than twenty percent of the Experts program, StreetEasy pauses adding new agents from that company until the percentage drops. Compass International Holdings is currently the only company exceeding this threshold. StreetEasy says no existing Experts will lose their spots and that these measures are about managing the program going forward.
The fight between these two giants has put New York City agents and brokers in a difficult position. Some industry leaders worry that inventory fragmentation is harming consumers who have grown accustomed to finding nearly all listings on StreetEasy and now cannot see all available homes. One agent noted that the artificial reduction in visible inventory on public-facing platforms could confuse buyers who wonder if they are missing opportunities or misjudging offer prices.
However, others see potential benefits for skilled, well-connected agents who know how to navigate multiple inventory sources and maintain relationships across different brokerages. These agents may be able to access off-market opportunities that give them an advantage. Meanwhile, some brokers view Compass's strategy of hiding inventory on the participants-only side of the Real Estate Board's system as an abuse designed to create a private marketplace rather than protect legitimate client privacy concerns.
What I'm seeing locally here in the Bay Area and East Bay is that our market operates quite differently from New York's structure, but this conflict does underscore something important for our buyers and sellers. Our reliance on the Bay Area's multiple listing service to provide transparency and broad exposure is a real advantage. When there's concentration of listings across different platforms or deliberate fragmentation of what consumers can see, it creates exactly the kind of frustration and inequity we're watching play out in New York. For families trying to buy or sell homes, the best outcome comes when inventory is visible and accessible to everyone.
