NEW YORK CITY–As the afternoon session of the Compass-Zillow preliminary injunction hearing got underway in courtroom 14C at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S. Courthouse in downtown Manhattan on Nov. 18, with Judge Jeannette Vargas presiding, the intensity from the morning session continued with Compass CEO Robert Reffkin on the stand.
Throughout the day, attorney Bonnie Lau, representing Zillow, would not allow Reffkin to delay or in any way not answer the yes/no questions she put to him, largely focusing on his public statements related to Compass’s financials as the brokerage seeks to prove new Zillow listing rules will cause “irreparable harm” if Vargas does not issue an injunction to block them. The hearing, scheduled to run through Friday, is focused on that injunction.
Reffkin previously said that Zillow’s rules—which disallow listings that are not immediately made available across public platforms (and Zillow)–are causing tremendous harm to Compass that is “unquantifiable” in the form of lost trust, traffic and business.
A source familiar with Compass’s thinking told RISMedia the company believes the case is not about private listings, as Zillow’s rules allow listings that are not marketed publicly at all, but more about where public or semi-public marketing occurs. But even the definition of “private listing” has been hotly debated at the trial, with Reffkin saying that “Private Exclusives” is “just a branded term…that people like,” and those listings are “not private.”
“It helps agents make you feel special as sellers that you have a private listing,” he said.
After the break, Lau presented a visual of an April 12 email from Reffkin to Compass Chief of Staff Will Hardy. It was titled, ‘50 compelling reasons you can give your sellers to explain why being on Zillow is not necessarily in their best interest.’
“Do you recognize that email? Did you write it?” she asked Reffkin. “No,” he replied. “That’s from ChatGPT.”
Earlier in the proceedings Reffkin explained how Compass had planned new billboards across the country, with bold type reading: ‘See 25% of homes for sale before any other site.’
“But we were forced to scrap it,” he lamented, following Zillow’s new rules (and an alleged leak to the press) .
Lau then showed a video of Reffkin at the 2025 Compass RETREAT, which took place after Zillow’s action. Reffkin was shown on stage with the huge billboard behind him, telling audience members, “If you’re in one of our major markets and know the perfect place for one of our billboards, take a photo and email me so we can put this up there.”
She had no further questions.
Kerry Carr, an agent with Compass for six years, with a team of 14 agents in the Philadelphia area, was next on the stand. She outlined for a Compass attorney how she and her team would be impacted if Zillow’s ban is allowed to continue.
“My team takes leads from Zillow; they represent about 50% of our income,” said Carr. She offered details on Compass’s 3-Phase Marketing Program, with the first part being Private Exclusives, wherein sellers do not, for whatever reason, want to be on the MLS. From just such a listing she received word from Zillow that it broke the portal’s rules, allegedly telling Carr that all listings were either put on Zillow immediately or would never get on the platform.
Asked about her reaction, she said, “I was angry. I asked Zillow why. All I got were Chat bot answers.”
She further explained that it was her fiduciary responsibility to tell clients that if Zillow banned their listing she would need to be fired and a new agent hired, losing the listing. And not only would she not make a commission, but would lose money spent on marketing and would also lose out on referral business from said client. The Zillow rules also “change my options,” Carr said, adding that she “worried” about junior agents on her team who might lose listings that amount to a significant portion of their income.
Zillow’s lawyer countered.
“You agree that in general, it’s more fair if all buyers have the chance to see and bid on a home that is for sale?” asked Eric Tuttle, another lawyer representing the portal. Carr agreed. He then argued that if all brokerages had private exclusive programs, it would take buyers a lot more time to find them. “And none of your clients have been unable to sell or buy a home because of Zillow’s listing access standards, correct?” he asked. “Correct,” she replied.
Zillow also sought to show that Compass had purposefully misled agents, or at least failed to inform them that the new Zillow rules could result in their listings being removed from that platform. Carr, after getting a warning from Zillow, had reached out to Hardy at Compass.
Carr said she “couldn’t recall” exactly what Hardy told her, but admitted that Compass had never told her that Zillow’s policy could result in Private Exclusive listings being banned. Zillow had previously sought to show that Reffkin and Compass knew from the beginning that Zillow’s rules would affect “Private Exclusives,” something Reffkin sharply disputed in his earlier testimony.
Carr acknowledged that it would be her duty to inform clients of that, but also affirmed that she had not “yet” lost any business or clients due to the Zillow rules.
The lead up
Later in the day, Errol Samuelson, Zillow’s chief industry development officer, took the stand. Compass attorney Kenneth Dintzer went back and forth with him about definitions, potential changes to the Clear Cooperation Policy and other matters, initially focusing on the fact that Zillow receives millions of listings from brokerages, while only contributing a few thousand itself.
Samuelson acknowledged that Zillow’s business model involves getting “as many listings as we can.”
Samuelson also addressed Zillow’s plans for if the Clear Cooperation policy had been repealed—something Compass lobbied for last year. Zillow’s internal documents from late last year, presented by Dintzer, included worries that CoStar and Compass would “relentlessly” push private listings, which had “negative implications for Zillow.”
Samuelson countered that he thought the “whole marketplace” was at risk if Clear Cooperation was repealed. Zillow’s plans for a post-Clear Cooperation world included offering “carrots” to MLSs and brokerages that independently adopted similar policies, or more “hardline” tactics—inclding “remov(ing) listings from uncooperative brokerages.”
Samuelson qualified that the company discussed a lot of potential tactics to changes in Clear Cooperation, and that references to these more “hardline” tactics or using a “hammer” to keep sellers and agents on Zillow were suggestions or proposals rather than conclusions.
There was also a sharp back-and-forth on Zillow’s motivations, with Samuelson acknowledging that a “contagion” of private listings are bad for Zillow, but said that the company was acting more on its principles of transparency.
“I think if you look at all of the written documentation that we put on——there’s been a lot of it——we agree, it’s bad for Zillow, but our point is it is bad for consumers, competition, and the industry,” Samuelson said, adding that Zillow’s “hope” was that the rules “would cause agents to think twice about steering sellers into keeping their listings off the market.”
Dintzer also confronted Samuelson with other internal Zillow communications, including the explicit goal of using the new rules as “deterrence,” and that the company purposefully released an outline of the rules without the specific terms and conditions—something Reffkin also focused on in his testimony, disputing whether the rules were even in place or technically announced until the details were public in late May.
Compass is also seeking to prove that Zillow conspired with Redfin to ensure other portals adopted the same rules, with Samuelson questioned about communications he had with Joe Rath, head of industry relations at Redfin, shortly after the Zillow announcement in April.
In an internal Redfin email chain presented in court, Rath wrote that he spoke to Samuelson about the standards on April 14, the same day Redfin announced a similar policy, noting specific cases and how certain types of listings would be treated by Zillow.
Dintzer asked Samuelson if he shared specific elements of how Zillow’s rules applied and were enforced—particularly in relation to Compass—with Samuelson saying he couldn’t remember the call.
Zillow has strongly denied that it conspired with Redfin or anyone else, with Samuelson noting that he and other Zillow executives reached out extensively to brokerages, media and other stakeholders in the days leading up to the announcement—including Compass—and also fielded numerous inquiries afterward, clarifying the rules and answering questions. Zillow has also noted that after being acquired by Rocket, Redfin has so far not implemented its rules.
Jesse Williams contributed to this reporting.
