Zillow Group, Inc. (ZG) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy
Forensic Analysis · Professional & Commercial Services · as of Sep 24, 2026
Zillow Group, Inc. (ZG)
A forensic read on Zillow Group, Inc. built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a price-aware rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
D · Weak — demands caution
Forensic grade
Safe
Financial health
9.2
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
3
Forensic signals
122.5
P / E (ttm)
0.5%
ROE
$6.6B
Market cap
15.5%
Revenue growth
This free snapshot doesn't read filing or proxy text, so the auditor-quality and governance checks that can lower a grade were not evaluated (red flags, auditor quality, say on pay, board independence, going concern, valuation). Those checks only ever lower a grade, so the full analysis can land below the grade above but never above it — treat it as the most favourable reading, not the settled one.
Zillow Group, Inc. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 9.2, placing it in the Safe zone. 3 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
-0.7%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -0.7% in the latest fiscal year, against 5% in FY2021, having run between -5.1% and 4.8% across FY2021–FY2025 with no direction held — well below the ~10% cost of capital we hold this sector to, and it has been across FY2015–FY2025, so reinvested dollars have not been earning their keep. The capital base behind it cannot be compared across FY2021–FY2025: long-term debt is tagged in one of those two fiscal years and not the other, and an untagged line enters this calculation as zero, so any change in the base would be a change in what the filer tagged.
+1.6%/yr
FY2022–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +5% over the last 3 years to FY2025 (+1.6%/yr). The count is growing: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~1.6% shaved off per-share growth every year — total profit has to grow that much just to keep earnings-per-share flat, and a stake held since FY2022 has been diluted ~5%.
285% of FCF
FY2025
Shareholder returns.Returned $670M to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2025 — 285% of free cash flow. More than free cash flow generated — and beyond operating cash too, so the extra is coming from debt or cash reserves, which isn't sustainable indefinitely. Counting the $390M of stock-based comp paid out in shares on top of that, the combined claim on free cash flow is 451%.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$2.58B
Revenue Growth YoY+15.5%
Revenue CAGR (3yr)+9.7%
Net Margin0.9%
Free Cash Flow$235.0M
Return on Equity0.5%
Debt / Equity0.12x
The forensic grade and screens above are free — no account needed. Want the AI investment read on top — the 0–100 rating, thesis, bull-vs-bear, red flags and the 12-month scenario, written from Zillow Group, Inc.'s actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?