Seattle-based real estate tech company Redfin Corp. (Nasdaq: RDFN) on Tuesday laid off 201 employees, or about 4% of the company.
A company spokesperson confirmed the cuts to the Business Journal on Wednesday, citing "the housing downturn and economic uncertainty." It's the third round of layoffs Redfin has conducted since June as the company faces rising interest rates and a cooling housing market.
"While another layoff is painful, especially for those leaving the company, Redfin must continue to adapt to the current economic climate," the spokesperson said in the statement. "The people leaving Redfin have been wonderful colleagues, and if they wanted to return, we’d welcome them back in a stronger housing market."
Laid-off employees will receive between 10 and 15 weeks of severance, depending on time with the company, as well as three months of health care coverage. The spokesperson added that real estate support was the primary group affected.
Redfin laid off about 470 employees in June, which made up about 6% of the company's total workforce at the time. Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman in a June message to employees wrote "we don’t have enough work for our agents and support staff, and fewer sales leaves us with less money for headquarters projects."
In November, Redfin laid off about 862 employees, or roughly 13% of its staff, and shuttered its home-flipping service RedfinNow, in which Redfin buys homes directly from sellers, does renovations and sells them for a profit.
"The share gains we could attribute to iBuying have become less certain as we rolled it out more broadly, especially now that our offers are so low," Kelman said in an all-staff email at the time of the November layoffs. "iBuying is a staggering amount of money and risk for a now-uncertain benefit. We’ve tied up hundreds of millions of dollars in houses that you yourself wouldn’t want to own right now."
In a November filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Redfin said it had reduced its headcount 27% since April through attrition and layoffs.
Redfin had 5,572 employees at the end of 2022. In addition to its brokered listings and home search tool, Redfin offers mortgages and a service for high-end homes called Redfin Premier. Redfin started listing rentals in March of 2022 after acquiring Atlanta-based RentPath for $608 million in 2021.
Multiple local residential real estate companies have laid off employees recently. Seattle-based Redfin competitor Zillow laid off 300 employees in October. In November 2021, Zillow announced it was shuttering its own home-flipping business, Zillow Offers, and laying off about 25% of its staff in a move that would take several quarters. Seattle-based Flyhomes, meanwhile, conducted two rounds of layoffs last year.
