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Zillow Expands Home Buying Service To LA, OC

Online real estate site Zillow is expanding its home buying service, Zillow Offers, to the Los Angeles and Orange County markets, saying this morning that it will now let homeowners sell their homes directly to the company, to avoid the hassles of selling their home. According to Zillow, Zillow Offers also is available in the Inland Empire (Riverside) and San Diego. Zillow said that Los Angeles represents the largest market now where Zillow Offers is available. Zillow already runs the instant home buying service across the country, with the addition of LA and OC bringing the total to 221 markets. The home buying service--like others on the market--allows homeowners to bypass the hassle of getting a real estate agent and showing and selling their home, by allowing those homeowners to submit information on their homes and gain an offer from Zillow to purchase the home directly. Zillow said an addition benefit of its service is home sellers can control the timeline and close date to fit their schedule, and they also do not have to deal with repairs or improvements to sell their home. Zillow claims that sellers who declined an offer from the company and went on to sell traditionally sold their homes for an average of just 0.22 percent more than Zillow's offer.