Zillow vs Reality: Kennewick Zestimates®

Between January 16, 2019, and June 14, 2019, we recorded 218 home sales in Kennewick. The data below reflect all Kennewick home sales that we tracked.

Median Error Rate

Median error rate is the primary metric that Zillow uses to gauge the accuracy of Zestimates®. In late January 2019, Zillow said its median error rate nationwide is 4.5 percent. That means half of all Zestimates® are within 4.5 percent of the actual sales price.

Zestimates® in Kennewick are more inaccurate than they are across the Tri-Cities as a whole, and worse than neighboring big cities like Seattle and Portland. Based on our research, the median error rate of Zestimates® in Kennewick is 7.7 percent. In other words, half of the Zestimates® in Kennewick are wrong by more than 7.7 percent of the actual selling price and half are wrong by less than 7.7 percent.

For comparison, our research shows the median Zestimate® error rate across the whole Tri-Cities is 5.6 percent. Seattle’s median error rate is 2.2 percent and Portland’s is 1.5 percent, according to Zillow’s own tracking.

Are Kennewick Zestimates® Too High or Too Low?

In Kennewick, Zestimates® are usually higher than the actual sales price. Of our 218 homes tracked, the Zestimates® of 190 homes (87%) were higher than the sales price. The Zestimates® of 28 homes (13%) were lower than the actual sales price.

Range of Zestimate® Inaccuracies

On its website, Zillow measures how many Zestimates® are more than 5, 10 and 20 percent wrong. We’ve done the same thing with our Kennewick data.

5 Percent Wrong

62 percent of all Kennewick Zestimates® were off by 5 percent or more.

10 Percent Wrong

38 percent of all Kennewick Zestimates® were at least 10 percent off.

20 Percent Wrong

11 percent of all Kennewick Zestimates® were at least 20 percent off.

Zestimate® Accuracy & Inaccuracy in Dollars

We can also look at the accuracy/inaccuracy of Zestimates® in terms of how many dollars they were off when compared to the actual sales price.

• 45 homes (21 percent) had a Zestimate® that was at least $50,000 off. That’s about one of every five homes sold.
• 15 homes (7 percent) had a Zestimate® that was at least $75,000 off.
• 4 homes (2 percent) had a Zestimate® that was wrong by $100,000 or more.

On the flip side:

• 29 homes (13 percent) sold with a Zestimate® that was within $5,000 of the sales price. That’s about one of every eight homes sold.
• 16 homes (7 percent) had a Zestimate® that was within $2,500 of the sales price.
• 7 Kennewick homes (3 percent) sold with a Zestimate® that was within $1,000 of the sales price.

Most & Least Inaccurate Kennewick Zestimates®

Among the 218 Kennewick home sales/Zestimates® we recorded, the most egregiously wrong Zestimates® were:

• A home sold in May with a Zestimate® that was $208,335 more than the actual sales price — the most inaccurate Zestimate® by dollar amount.
• A different Kennewick home sold in May with a Zestimate® that was 85.3 percent higher than the actual sales price — the most inaccurate Zestimate® by percent.

The least inaccurate (or most accurate) Zestimate® was a home that sold in May for just $37 less than the Zestimate®.

Monthly Trends

Over the course of our study, Kennewick Zestimates® improved at the lower levels of inaccuracy. The percentage of Zestimates® that were wrong by at least 5 percent and at least 10 percent both dropped slightly between February and May. On the other hand, the percentage of Zestimates® wrong by 20% or more jumped from 7 percent in February to 15 percent in May.

(Note: For monthly trends, we’re not including January and June because we don’t have a full month of data for either.)

Navigation

1. Zillow vs Reality: Introduction
2. Zillow vs. Reality: Key Takeaways
3. Zillow vs. Reality: All Tri-Cities Zestimates®
4. Zillow vs. Reality: Kennewick Zestimates® (this page)
5. Zillow vs. Reality: Pasco Zestimates®
6. Zillow vs. Reality: Richland Zestimates®
7. Zillow vs. Reality: West Richland Zestimates®
8. Zillow vs. Reality: Home Value Comparisons
9. Our Methodology