A federal judge on Friday partially granted Zillow’s temporary restraining order against Lisle-based Midwest Real Estate Data, allowing for the immediate restoration of Chicago-area listing data on the company’s real estate platforms.
It’s a big win for Zillow in what’s been an escalating fight with MRED, which supplies thousands of home listings to Zillow as a multiple listing service.
MRED had cut Zillow’s access to its listing data feed on Wednesday, causing consumers to miss out on seeing roughly 43,000 properties, including thousands in Chicago, on Zillow’s websites.
Zillow said in a statement: “Today’s ruling is an important first step for the Chicago home buyers, sellers and agents who have been harmed by a coordinated scheme between MRED and Compass to reduce transparency in the housing market. In the middle of a housing affordability crisis, powerful industry players colluded to hide listings, suppress competition and steer consumers toward a single dominant brokerage. The court immediately recognized what was at stake, not just for Zillow, but for every person trying to find or sell a home across Illinois and beyond. And it found we have a likelihood of success by granting the motion. We will continue to fight to ensure this anti-consumer conduct is not allowed to take root permanently.”
The company said its listing feed from MRED has been restored, and all active listings have been reposted. About 5,000 Chicago listings appeared on Zillow’s website by 5:15 p.m., compared to 2,000 listings around 4 p.m.
MRED and Zillow’s ongoing fight revolves around MRED’s private listing network, where homes for sale are shared among real estate professionals. MRED manages listings — submitted by brokers — in Illinois, as well as parts of Wisconsin and Indiana. It announced in April that it was expanding its long-time private listing network nationwide. As part of that expansion, New York-based brokerage Compass would feed its listings to MRED — including private listings.
But Zillow said the move violated its standards for what homes could appear on its websites. The recent policy stipulated that homes marketed to buyers behind a paywall or login portal are not eligible to appear on Zillow because they’re private.
Zillow sued MRED and Compass last week, accusing the two of violating federal antitrust law by conspiring to hide home listings from potential buyers. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, also said the deal creates a monopoly where buyers and sellers will only want to work with Compass agents.
MRED pushed back Monday by threatening to suspend Zillow’s access to its feed of listing data unless the company corrected a violation of its license agreements and MRED’s rules, which involved Zillow’s refusal to display nine listings. MRED made good on its promise Wednesday, with thousands of listings disappearing across Zillow’s websites.
By Wednesday afternoon, the number of Chicago listings had plummeted to about 1,700 from nearly 5,000.
MRED pushed back against Zillow on Friday, saying the court order stipulates that Zillow cannot selectively ban listings, such as the nine it previously refused to display.
The court also ordered that Zillow may not ban listings within ZIP codes nationwide where MRED has had listings between April 2025 and April 2026.
“The central issue remains unchanged: Zillow wants the benefit of receiving MLS listing data while reserving the right to discriminate against certain lawful listings, sellers, and brokers whose marketing strategies it disfavors,” MRED said in a statement to the Sun-Times. “The court’s ruling makes clear that Zillow cannot ignore their license obligations and MRED’s reasonable rules that benefit all participants in our cooperative marketplace and undermine the value of the MLS.”