Judge orders MRED to restore Zillow listing feeds in Chicago

Chicagoland area listings are back on Zillow and Trulia as of Friday afternoon, after Chicago-based federal Judge John Tharp, Jr. granted Zillow’s preliminary injunction motion seeking to prevent Midwest Real Estate Data (MRED) from suspending its listing feeds. 

On Monday, Zillow filed the motion in its antitrust lawsuit against MRED and Compass International Holdings, after MRED notified it that the MLS would suspend its listing feeds unless Zillow cured what the MLS called a “material breach of its license agreements” by late Tuesday. On Wednesday morning, MRED announced that it had suspended Zillow’s listing feed.

According to MRED, this dispute centered on Zillow’s selective removal of nine listings that the MLS maintained were being marketed lawfully under its rules. Zillow told HousingWire that none of these nine listings are in MRED’s traditional Chicagoland service area. According to the announcement, Zillow’s stance prompted MRED to shut off a feed covering roughly 43,000 active listings, or 99.98% of the MLS’s inventory, from the portal’s consumer-facing platforms. The Illinois-based MLS said that it notified Zillow two weeks ago that selectively excluding listings from participating brokers violated Zillow’s license agreements with the MLS. MRED gave Zillow until 11:59 p.m. Central time on May 19, 2026, to fix the issue. Zillow did not do so, the MLS said.

In an emailed statement, a Zillow spokesperson told HousingWire, that the ruling on its motion was “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 spokesperson wrote. “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. We will continue to fight to ensure this anti-consumer conduct is not allowed to take root permanently.”

Neither MRED nor Compass International Holdings immediately returned HousingWire’s request for comment on the ruling. 

The motion was part of a larger antitrust lawsuit filed by Zillow earlier this month. In the complaint, Zillow alleges that the Chicagoland MLS and the nation’s largest brokerage conspired to withhold listing data and pressure Zillow to carry private “hidden” listings nationwide. The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Chicago, accuses MRED and Compass of coordinating to threaten Zillow’s access to the Chicagoland listing feed unless the portal agreed to display Compass private listings across the United States. Zillow claims this conduct amounts to an unlawful group boycott and abuse of monopoly power under the federal Sherman Antitrust Act.