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Anywhere, Compass and Zillow fall off Fortune 500

Housing market downturn crippled top resi, mortgage firms

Anywhere's Ryan Schneider, Compass' Robert Reffkin and ZIllow's Rich Barton

Anywhere’s Ryan Schneider, Compass’ Robert Reffkin and ZIllow’s Rich Barton (Illustration by Kevin Rebong for The Real Deal; Getty/Compass/Anywhere/Zillow)

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Jun 6, 2023, 3:48 PM

UPDATED June 6, 5:00 p.m.: This year’s Fortune 500 list was released this week, noticeably missing a few top major residential real estate companies featured in the previous edition. 

Compass, Anywhere and Zillow all fell off of the list ranking the largest companies by revenue, Fortune first reported. The shifting ranks show how hard high mortgage rates and limited inventory hit the firms in the second half of 2022 and crippled the housing market nationwide. 

Zillow ranked 424th on the list unveiled last June, followed by Anywhere at 427th and Compass at 495th. But the firms were nowhere to be found after revenues fell by 24 percent, 6 percent and 14 percent, respectively. 

Rocket Companies, the parent company of Rocket Mortgage, was another real estate player absent from this year’s list. Last year brought layoffs and massive losses to the top mortgage firm, which reduced its 2022 expenses by 25 percent to counter the difficult market. 

A spokesperson for Compass brushed off the drop, pointing to RealTrends rankings that have positioned the company as the “number one brokerage in the country for two years in a row.”

Anywhere declined to comment, and Zillow did not immediately respond.

Home sales boomed at the onset of the pandemic as mortgage rates dwindled to as low as 2 percent, but the market took a hit last spring when the Federal Reserve began driving up interest rates. In October, mortgage rates rose above 7 percent, hitting a 21-year high and driving mortgage applications down to their slowest pace since 1997. 

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Compass initiated a series of aggressive cost-cutting measures at the start of last year, after proclaiming it would be cash-flow positive in 2023. The firm laid off 800 tech employees across two rounds of layoffs, followed by another round of layoffs in January 2023.

The New York-based brokerage, headed by CEO Robert Reffkin, lost $602 million last year, about $100 million more than in 2021. 

Anywhere — the parent company of Corcoran, Coldwell Banker, Century 21 and Sotheby’s International Realty — finished 2022 with $287 million in losses. The company, formerly known as Realogy, cut employees in August followed by another round in January 2023 when it also announced the closure of its iBuying business. 

Zillow posted losses in both the third and fourth quarters of 2022. Its year-end losses totaled $101 million, slimmed down from nearly $600 million recorded in 2021 on the back of its failed home-flipping business. The company’s mortgage segment suffered the biggest blow with $167 million in losses last year, compared to $52 million in 2021. 

The listing platform led by CEO Rich Barton also imposed two major rounds of layoffs last year, reducing its workforce by 2,000 employees. 

This story has been updated with a statement from Compass.

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