Burnout disguised as “high performance” - Business Advisor Zillow Employee Review

1.0
18 Dec 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good benefits, remote work is nice and that’s about it

Cons

The Business Advisor role is unsustainable. Quotas are aggressive, constantly changing, and often feel completely disconnected from market conditions, product limitations, or client reality. Every quarter brings higher expectations with little to no additional support and missing numbers more than once quickly turns into a performance issue rather than a conversation. There’s a lot of talk about being “customer obsessed,” but advisors are routinely forced to push revenue even when accounts are struggling due to billing issues, product bugs, or performance gaps entirely outside of our control. You’re expected to be sales, retention, support, billing, and product all at once, yet you don’t actually have the authority to fix most of the problems you’re held accountable for. Leadership feedback is often reactive and top-down. Frontline input is acknowledged but rarely acted on, and the culture increasingly feels driven by fear of missing targets rather than long-term strategy or employee development. High performers are rewarded with more accounts, more pressure, and higher quotas not balance or growth. Pay is below market, and compensation does not reflect performance. After a so-called “top-performing year,” Business Advisors received a $5,000 pay cut, while the company simultaneously partnered with and hired Rent. representatives at significantly higher salaries than existing employees. The lack of pay equity and transparency makes it hard to feel valued or motivated to stay. Internal promotion is rare. Nearly every manager I worked under was an external hire with a long ramp-up period, despite there being strong, experienced team leads who were ready to step into those roles. The lack of internal growth opportunities is discouraging and slows teams down. Burnout is common, morale swings wildly by quarter, and attrition is quietly accepted as normal.

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Zillow Response
4mo
We're sorry to hear that we missed the mark in providing you with a positive employee experience. We know feedback around workload, expectations, compensation, and growth speaks to how people experience their day-to-day work, and it’s important for us to hear that perspective. While experiences can vary, reflections like yours help highlight where disconnects can exist between intent and reality. If you're open to continuing the conversation, please reach out to us at careers@zillowgroup.com.

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Cons

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3.0
8 May 2026
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Pros

You can make good money here.

Cons

In sales, job can change often. For example: I was making good money and excelling because I am a relationship Sales person. Then they changed it to where you get the sale, and instead of being able to grow that account via that relationship you just broke into, you have to pass it to an account manager and go back to cold/robo calling. You "book" of business you recive to prospect from is a lottery. I received a book of prospects/accounts that most of the were low income, or senior living properties. They don't have a budget and have a line of renter on a waitlist. No way to convince them to spend money on advertising but you still have the same quota.

2
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Zillow Response
1mo
Thank you for sharing such a detailed perspective. We understand that frequent changes to roles, account ownership and business priorities can have a real impact on relationship-building and the day-to-day experience in sales. We’re glad to hear compensation was a positive part of your time at Zillow, and we appreciate you being candid about where the model and structure felt frustrating. Feedback like yours helps us better understand how these changes are experienced across teams as the business evolves.
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