Sell my house to Zillow? You cannot, and here is what a Utah seller can do instead.

How does a local Utah cash offer compare with the iBuyers still operating?

The main iBuyer along the Wasatch Front, as of this writing, is Opendoor. The difference between its offer and ours is what comes off the number after you say yes. An iBuyer prices from data, then adjusts after an assessment and takes a service fee. We price after one walkthrough, and the written number is the number the title company wires.

On a newer house in good condition inside a zip code it covers, an iBuyer can pay more than we can, and a listing can beat both of us. The fee-by-fee version, and the case where you should take the iBuyer’s number, is on our comparison with an iBuyer. Before you sign with any buyer, us included, run through the seven questions on companies that buy houses.

How much less than the Zestimate should you expect from a cash offer?

It depends on the house, and the Zestimate is the wrong starting point anyway. A Zestimate is a model’s guess at a listed sale price, built from public records and nearby sales by software that has never seen your kitchen. A cash offer begins with the repaired value instead, then subtracts the repairs, the buyer’s holding and resale costs, and a margin.

Take a Herriman house with a Zestimate of $520K, a roof at the end of its life and a furnace from the 1990s, and suppose the two repairs come to $30K. These figures are examples, not a quote.

• Listed through an agent. You fix the roof first or you take an inspection credit for it. Suppose the house sells at $520K. Off that come the commission and closing costs, at the 5% to 6% and 1% to 3% ranges we use on our cash buyer vs realtor page, then the $30K of work and three months of mortgage, taxes and utilities while it sits. On these example numbers the seller nets roughly $440K, and that assumes the buyer’s loan and appraisal both hold.
• Opendoor. The first number starts near the model’s figure. Then the service fee comes off, and after the assessment the same roof and furnace come off as deductions. The net is their offer minus both, and you only know it once the assessment is done.
• A local cash buyer. One written number with the roof and the furnace already inside it, and nothing off afterward. On this house, expect our number to come in under that $440K listed net, because what it costs us to fix and resell it comes out of that same price.

How far under depends on the work, the street, and how quickly the house will resell. A house that needs $5K of paint sits close to the listed net; a house with a failed foundation sits far from it. To find out, get the number in writing and set it beside the listed net, not beside the Zestimate. Our cash offer page shows how to test the three figures behind an offer.

When is listing on Zillow the better choice?

Whenever the house is in good shape and you can wait. A market-ready house in a strong Wasatch Front neighborhood, Herriman included, will usually net more listed on Zillow through an agent than it will from any cash buyer, us included, even after the commission comes out. A listing puts the house in front of every buyer in the county at once, and their competition is what lifts the price.

List it if most of these are true:

• The house would photograph well for a Zillow listing after a weekend of cleaning and paint
• Another quarter of payments, taxes and insurance would not hurt you
• Nothing about your timing depends on a closing date
• Nobody is living there who cannot leave for showings

Get a cash number if one of these is true instead:

• The inspection would find work you cannot fund before listing
• The date is set for you: a trustee sale, a move already booked, a job that starts soon
• The house is part of an estate or a divorce, or it has a tenant in it
• It is sitting empty and every month costs you money

Questions people ask

Does Zillow still buy houses?

No. Zillow wound down Zillow Offers, its home-buying program, starting in November 2021, and it has not bought houses since. A cash offer requested on Zillow’s site today comes from a partner company, not from Zillow.

Which iBuyers operate in Utah?

As of this writing, Opendoor says it buys houses in Salt Lake City and the surrounding area. Others have come and gone, and coverage is by zip code and changes without notice, so put your address into the company’s own site rather than trusting a list, including this one.

How accurate is the Zestimate for a cash offer?

For a cash offer it is not very useful. The Zestimate estimates what a listed sale might bring from records and nearby sales, and nobody sees inside the house to make it, so it is an estimate and not an appraisal. A cash offer is priced from the condition of the house and the cost to resell it, so compare it with the net from a listing.

Is a Zillow cash offer the same as a cash buyer’s offer?

No. As of this writing, a cash offer requested through Zillow comes from Opendoor, an iBuyer, and it carries a service fee and deductions that are set after an assessment. A local cash buyer’s offer is one number with the condition already priced in. Both are cash and both skip the lender; they differ in what gets subtracted after you say yes.

Does Zillow charge a fee to sell?

Not to you directly, as of this writing. Zillow is paid by the agents and partners it refers you to. What you pay is the agent’s commission on a listing, or the partner’s service fee and deductions on a cash offer. Ask for either one in dollars before you sign.

If the house shows well and you can carry it for three months, list it on Zillow with an agent and take the higher number. We lose that comparison on most houses in good shape, and we say so on the phone. We win on the house a listing would struggle with: the roof, the tenant, the date, the estate. If that is yours, get your cash offer in writing and hold it against the listed net. It costs nothing, and you can use it as a benchmark whether or not you ever sell to us.