By admin 
PHOENIX (AZFamily) — Two rival apartment-listing giants must scrap an alleged illegal deal and pay $2 million after state and federal regulators accused them of secretly agreeing to stop competing with each other.
Read more Suspect in Tucson Police recruit murder appears in court
In Feb. 2025, officials said Zillow paid Redfin $100 million to stop advertising apartments in buildings with 25 or more units and hand that business over to Zillow. In exchange, Redfin agreed to stay out of that market for up to nine years and only show apartment listings that also appear on Zillow’s sites.
Zillow and Redfin run two of the top three websites renters use to search for apartments, and that building managers use to list available units.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and five attorneys general, including Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, sued Zillow and Redfin eight months after the agreement was made. Officials alleged the deal broke federal antitrust law and hurt building managers and renters with higher prices, fewer listings and worse service.
Under the settlement, Zillow and Redfin must start competing again as they did before. Redfin will rebuild its own apartment advertising business, and both companies must drop parts of their deal that kept Redfin from competing with its own listings and ads.
Redfin must list its own apartment units and will no longer exclusively show Zillow’s listings, according to officials. The two companies are also banned from making similar deals in the future and must pay $2 million.
Read more Arizona girl collects nearly 30k diapers in annual donation drive
“Arizona renters deserve a competitive market, not a backroom deal that lets two of the biggest players in online apartment listings agree to stop competing with each other,” Mayes said in a statement. “Zillow paid Redfin $100 million to walk away from the marketplace in a scheme to rig the market at the expense of Arizona families searching for a place to live and the property owners trying to reach them. This settlement forces both companies back into real competition.”
The FTC, Mayes and attorneys general from Connecticut, New York, Washington and Virginia were part of the settlement.
See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it.
Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here with a brief description.
Read more What to know about Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods and rising tensions between once-close allies