Realtor.com's Move Announces Regretful Company Layoffs

More news on companies cutting costs to make up for loss of revenue while the market struggles amidst the coronavirus pandemic. Realtor.com has laid off over 100 Move employees across all departments of its California headquarters. 

Move CEO David Doctorow had announced the layoffs in a statement to his employees.

He explained that when he took over the position of CEO, his goal was to simplify the company to drive progression. In the statement, he said:

“As we were working through what this realignment would look like and the impact it would have on all of us, the COVID-19 global pandemic hit with full force in March. It was then that we quickly recognized how urgent it was to cut costs significantly. In response, we announced major reductions to our hiring, travel, and marketing expenses on March 31 and enacted those immediately, hoping these steps would be sufficient to weather the storm.”

The company had a number of leadership changes last month, including Ben Rubenstein, a founder of Opcity, being named Chief Revenue Officer, and Opcity’s other founder, Michael Lam, as the new Chief Operations Officer. Around the same time, two veteran executives left the company.

Among leadership shakeups and layoffs, the company was not immune to issues arising from the financial impact the pandemic has had on the market. Agents were given discounts on their agent advertising platform as an incentive to keep with the company. Realtor.com has yet to disclose how much that had cost the company, but the action is similar to what Zillow has done to cut company costs.