Zillow Group is cutting just over 500 jobs, about 7 per cent of its global workforce, in its largest and second layoff round of 2026.
CEO Jeremy Wacksman announced the cuts in a company blog post on Tuesday, framing them as part of a restructuring to support what he called the company’s next phase of growth. The move comes a day before Zillow reports its second-quarter 2026 earnings, according to HousingWire.
“These are difficult decisions that reflect both the strides we’re making in our strategy and the reality of what is required of us to grow at scale,” Mr Wacksman said.
He said the company is “grateful to every person who is leaving” and is providing transition support, though details of that support haven’t been disclosed.
The layoffs follow a strong first quarter for the company. Zillow’s Q1 2026 revenue rose 18 per cent year-over-year to US$708 million, with net income climbing to US$46 million from US$8 million a year earlier, even as the broader housing market grew just 2 per cent according to NAR figures cited by GeekWire.
Mr Wacksman described the housing market as “essentially flat” while claiming Zillow continues to “outperform the category.”
He said the restructuring is about “ensuring we have a disciplined cost structure and getting more efficient, with the right people in the right positions,” adding that “continuing to grow at scale requires us to work differently than we do today.”
Zillow hasn’t confirmed which teams are affected, how the Seattle headquarters will be hit, or what severance is on offer. It also hasn’t said whether AI factored directly into this round of cuts – though Mr Wacksman told real estate executives at the T3 Leadership Summit in April that staff were being retrained to use AI in their roles, with gains he described as “small, but they’re compounding,” as reported by Real Estate News.
This is Zillow’s second workforce reduction of the year, following roughly 200 positions cut in January as part of its annual performance review cycle. Those cuts had largely been backfilled by March 31, when the company reported 7,058 employees, just 10 fewer than at the end of 2025.
The cuts also land against a wider consolidation across US real estate portals and property technology. GeekWire reports CoStar has cut its Homes.com inside-sales team by nearly 40 per cent in recent months, Better founder Vishal Garg has stepped down as CEO amid cost-cutting, and Rocket Companies cut about 2 per cent of its combined workforce after closing its US$1.75 billion acquisition of Redfin last year.
This story draws on reporting from HousingWire and GeekWire. Read the original HousingWire story here and the GeekWire story here.