Court Dismisses "Baseless" Taylor V Zillow Lawsuit For Deficient Claims

A federal judge has granted Zillow’s motion to dismiss the Taylor v. Zillow lawsuit, filed in February.

Alucard Taylor sued Zillow in September 2025, alleging steering tactics that led homebuyers to pay inflated costs, hidden fee structures, and other anticompetitive practices.

Zillow has consistently defended itself in the case, arguing that the Taylor lawsuit failed to allege any illegality on Zillow's part.

And now the case has been dismissed entirely, after the plaintiffs' fifth round of amendments failed to bring evidence of illegal behaviour.

Judge James L. Robart of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington wrote that the Taylor case is "implausible given Zillow's express, repeated disclosures."

"Plaintiffs fail to plead specific facts showing how Defendants' practices actively undermined the home-buying process, restricted informed lender choice, or eroded trust in real estate professionals."

In a company announcement, Zillow said:

A federal judge has granted Zillow’s motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ baseless complaint in the Taylor v. Zillow lawsuit.

The court rejected plaintiffs' entire suit, even after five rounds of complaints, finding that every claim they asserted against Zillow and its partners in their 100+ page complaint was deficient. Plaintiffs did not allege anything that would deceive a reasonable consumer.

The other theory at the core of the case fared no better. Plaintiffs claimed Zillow's tools drove up what buyers paid for homes, but the court rejected those claims. As we’ve explained from the start, our tools don’t drive buyer-agent commissions. Nor are buyers ever required to finance with Zillow Home Loans. And of the 11 plaintiffs in this case, only two even used Zillow Home Loans, and neither could show that drove up their costs.

What the court ultimately found was that plaintiffs had described ordinary business activity and called it a conspiracy.

We’ve said from the start that the arguments in this case were completely baseless — and the court agreed. We’ll continue doing what we’ve always done: building tools that give consumers more transparency, more information and more choice in the home-buying process.