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Hey Professionals, what's up with fraudulently listing the square footage of the lot as the square footage of the house?
Either this is done as a gimic (which is wrong and constitutes fraud / false advertisement in my eyes) or it's done out of ignorance and lack of proper training in using the listing services. I'm leaning toward it being a gimic given how obnoxiously prevalent this tactic has become. This cannot simply be attributed to a mistake or two here and there. I've also noticed this tactic in the time I've been shopping for a home become an increasing trend.
Please police up your own problem makers[/b] because your problem causers blemish the good agents as well.
All of the listings you cited are correct in the MLS for that area (had a broker friend in that area check them), so as others have stated, it's a Zillow problem, not the agent's. I think it's a fairly well-known issue, at least among people who have done their research, that Zillow does have problems pulling data correctly from the hundreds of MLS systems from which it sources listings. I have seen inaccuracies with square footage, location, neighborhoods, school info, listing status, etc... none of which agreed with the "original" listing.
If you are only using Zillow for your search, then good luck. I don't know many agents that endorse it as a reliable data source. This is not to say that square footage can be 'off' in a listing, but most agents I know will list their source for that number (such as public record) and disclose whether it includes or does not include a portion of the house such as a finished basement or porch. As with any profession, there are those that are careless and those that engage in deceptive practices, but in this instance I don't believe the agent had anything to do with the problem. Might be a good idea to cross-reference to other sites if you see what appears to be inaccurate data in the future...
Check the Realtor.com entry for the first listing you cited (it matches the MLS listing, unlike the Zillow entry):
The industry views Zillow as the court jester. As soon as the word Zillow is heard, the information is not deemed reliable. However, since the consumer has placed so much faith in this advertising site, Realtors and loan officers are working the site for the leads generated, when they really would like nothing to do with it.
As much as Realtors want to hate on Zillow, the listing agents are responsible for many of the errors. I just got back to the office from showing houses this morning. A 4 bedroom concrete block home on my list turned out to be a 2 bedroom wood frame house with a third "bedroom" in a separate structure in the back yard. Thank you Mr. Can't Be Bothered listing agent.
I finally received a response back from yesterday's request via Zillow to the listing agent mentioned in OP. It was someone else from their office with a generic response. I would think it was an autoresponder, but it took them nearly a day for it to trigger. It included a statement to let them know if I had any additional questions. I replied, my question was in the original response. They responded, sorry, I didn't see it. I asked again why the discrepancy. They have not yet responded to that. Unfortunately, I feel if I posted I wanted to see the home, the agent would already be there. They did just respond as I was typing this saying "Yeah they got it wrong. duly noted. Thank you." It will be interesting to see if it is corrected or not.
I notice you're talking about Maryland. Assuming the agent is posting in MRIS (the MLS) the square footage is pulled directly from the tax records. And as you probably know by now, the tax records only list the above ground square footage. I've very rarely seen inaccuracies in sq footage on MRIS; cannot speak to the website you're using (where owners can change their property information themselves). And as others have pointed out, the Zillow feeds from the MLS where it can get all screwed up. Its frustrating for us too.
I know realtors hate Zillow, but...there's a reason the general public likes it. It's got a great search engine with an easy to use interface, and lots of criteria variables, unlike most other sites. Realtors should take a clue from this when designing their own sites.
I certainly take the info on Zillow with a grain of salt, but since I'm trying to find a retirement location it's valuable as a tool to get a general idea of what's happening in an area. I would never use it as an source when ready to actually start house hunting because the information is so out of date.
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