Zillow launches a personalized hub that guides home buyers from first search to closing

The median home search for a buyer takes from three to four months, involves countless conversations with an agent and lender, and culminates in gathering documents at a few days' notice, all while tracking a budget on a spreadsheet. It's a process that moves more than half of buyers to tears, according to Zillow research. And today's market conditions aren't making it any easier. Buyers, nearly half of whom are first-timers, are navigating a market where the housing recovery is "back on pause," with mortgage rates climbing past 6.5%, adding more uncertainty to an already complex process.

Now, Zillow is giving buyers a clearer path forward: a single place where everything comes together. The new personalized hub guides buyers through four milestones: setting a budget, finding a home, making an offer and closing the deal. It brings together goals, finances, tasks, documents, and the agent and lender a buyer is working with, all in one place. And all of those details update automatically as the journey evolves, so buyers always know where they stand and what to do next.

"Zillow has spent 20 years turning on the lights in real estate, giving buyers and sellers access to information they'd never had before," said Jeremy Wacksman, Zillow's chief executive officer. "The next frontier is the journey itself: the financing, the coordination, the offer, the closing. For the first time, every home shopper on Zillow has a single place that brings it all together, so instead of wondering what comes next, they always know exactly where they are and what to do."

Personalized moving hub: A clear path from first search to closing
Home shoppers start by answering a single question, "Are you buying, selling, both, or just browsing?" From there, they receive a personalized plan.

The hub immediately displays:

• BuyAbility℠: This personalized, real-time affordability tool helps buyers understand the range of home prices and monthly payments that may fit their financial situation. They can then use that guidance to shop for homes that are realistically within reach. That information is updated with live mortgage rates.
• Local market insights: This includes market conditions, median days to pending, active listings and a one-year price forecast.
• The shopper's team: If a buyer is already working with an agent and loan officer, those contacts are given in this view. If the buyer doesn't have a team, the hub brings up Agent Finder to connect them with an agent in their area.

From there, buyers are guided through four milestones: setting a budget, finding a home, making an offer and closing the deal. The hub shows buyers which areas to focus on and lists the steps to follow below each milestone. Progress is updated automatically — when a buyer gets pre-approved, the hub moves forward; when they go under contract, closing tasks appear.

The hub is available now on iOS and Android, and will be coming soon to Zillow.com.

Three additional Summer Launch features give buyers and sellers the tools to plan their move
Zillow's Summer Launch goes beyond offering the personalized moving hub with the addition of three new features designed to help buyers and sellers move forward during those moments that matter most.

"Every feature in our Summer Launch was designed around a specific moment when buyers lose clarity or momentum," said Christopher Roberts, chief product officer at Zillow. "The hub gives buyers confidence by making a complex process easier. The shared collection feature helps partners collaborate on their home search, and the ability to shop with Verified Pre-approval shows buyers what they can actually afford on every listing, not just the list price. Zillow Preview opens the pre-market to every buyer, not just those in a certain network. Together, these features remove the friction that makes the home-buying process so hard."

Zillow Preview
Zillow Preview^SM gives soon-to-be sellers the opportunity to hire an agent to show their listing to the broadest online audience possible before it actually goes on the market. During this window, the home appears in every buyer's regular Zillow search, with a Preview label.

Buyers can now filter specifically for Preview listings. Once they find a home they're interested in, they can save it, pre-book a tour or use the time to get pre-approved — signals that indicate serious buyer interest. Sellers get real-time engagement data on views, saves and tour requests to refine their list price and strategy before their listing is fully active. Preview is available through more than 1,200 participating brokers nationwide.

With Zillow Preview, no private network is required. But sellers who decide to go the private-network route pay a price: They lose access to the full buyer pool and net 1.5% less on their sale, which could amount to more than $30,000 in high-cost markets, according to Zillow research. A Zillow survey conducted by The Harris Poll finds that 85% of soon-to-be sellers would be more likely to hire an agent who can show their listing to the broadest online audience before putting it on the market.

Shop with Zillow Home Loans Verified Pre-approval
Most buyers lack financial clarity when they start their home search. Only 28% of prospective buyers who plan to finance have been pre-approved before they begin their search, and about half don't know what pre-approval means, according to Zillow research.

Now buyers have a way to shop with Zillow Home Loans Verified Pre-approval, with that pre-approval connected directly to a buyer's home search. Buyers will clearly see whether a listing is a match or is out of their price range as they browse.

A home costs more than its list price. That's why taxes, insurance, HOA fees and closing costs are factored into Verified Pre-approval, so buyers understand why a higher-priced home may still fit within their means, or a lower-priced one may not. Zillow Home Loans is the only lender to integrate financing directly into the home search in this way, with the buyer's loan officer accessible throughout the process.

Shared collection
Most people buying a home aren't doing it alone. More than half of buyers in 2025 purchased their home with a partner, according to Zillow research, and for most of them, coordinating their search consisted of texting screenshots and forwarding listing links. The new shared collection feature replaces that with a single shared workspace inside Zillow, where buying partners can save, organize and compare homes together in real time, with any update immediately visible to both people, across iOS, Android and the web.

Tech momentum at Zillow keeps growing
Today's launch is the latest move by Zillow to streamline the home-buying process and build consumer confidence throughout the full transaction.

In summer 2025, the company introduced SkyTour, an interactive 3D exterior home tour built on Gaussian splatting technology originally developed by the gaming industry; and Offer Insights, a tool that shows buyers in real time how competitive different offer prices might be. In fall 2025, Zillow launched in-app messaging for co-shoppers, AI-powered virtual staging on Showcase^SM listings, and an integrated closing dashboard, connecting the front end of the search with the back end of the transaction.

Earlier this year, Zillow launched Zillow AI mode, a conversational AI experience built directly into the app that lets buyers and renters ask questions in plain language, explore neighborhoods, compare affordability and book tours without leaving Zillow. Now available to a growing number of users, it will be expanding throughout the year.

About Zillow Group: 
Zillow Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: Z and ZG) is reimagining real estate to make home a reality for more and more people.

As the most visited real estate app and website in the United States, Zillow connects hundreds of millions of consumers with innovative technology, trusted agents and loan officers, and seamless digital solutions. With industry-leading tools and resources, Zillow supercharges real estate professionals so they can grow their businesses and deliver exceptional client experiences. For renters and housing providers, Zillow offers not only a robust marketplace but a set of end-to-end products and services to streamline applications, leases, payments and more.

Zillow's ecosystem spans the entire home journey — from dreaming and shopping to renting, buying, selling and financing.

Zillow Group's affiliates, subsidiaries and brands include Zillow®, Zillow Premier Agent®, Zillow Home Loans®, Zillow Rentals®, Zillow® New Construction, Trulia®, StreetEasy®, Out East®, HotPads®, Follow Up Boss®, ShowingTime® and dotloop®.

All marks herein are owned by MFTB Holdco, Inc., a Zillow affiliate. Zillow Home Loans, LLC is an Equal Housing Lender, NMLS #10287 (www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org). © 2026 MFTB Holdco, Inc., a Zillow affiliate.

(ZFIN)

SOURCE Zillow