CoStar Group Reviews

Pros

As a first job out of uni, this has been an ideal placement for me, especially within my section of the company. The industry and scale of the CoStar group is seriously impressive and their status in the property industry is highly regarded. My team is amazing with a great balance of characters whom I now call my friends, and the hierarchy through management shows progression but is not overbearing and the bosses... are all very natural for a corporate. The offices in The Shard are amazing and that alone is a massive benefit to working here, the centrality of the building and the view means that life in the area is exciting. I actually cannot speak highly enough about my work here, and I have been here long enough that the novelty would have worn off - but it hasn't.

Cons

The corporate nature sometimes shows its bad side as far as politics and scale, although this has not affected me at all and it depends on how you react to it. While there are a decent number of events held, there could also be more teambuilding and ways of meeting everyone in the company that would help to increase the "humanness" of the environment above what it already is.

Advice to Management

The one thing that corporates seem to lose is the respect for human nature - do everything to not have this happen to CoStar - the Work/Life balance of employees is critical to happiness more than anything and I want everyone here to have the same great experience that I do. You can never organise too many social events, and I urge you to focus a lot of energy towards these.

Pros

Make your own schedule around pretty attainable metrics. No commission caps. Paychecks clear every time. Supportive management.

Cons

Career advancement should't be your goal as most managers make much less than reps hitting quota. One rate card for the entire nation - effectively reps in a major metro have an easier time selling the product vs. reps in rural areas.

Advice to Management

Look at each market and set expectations that can be truly achieved by a good sales rep. Major markets can easily hit the revenue goals in place. Smaller markets need some price breaks and also quota adjustments. Look at the actual penetration numbers vs. a roll up of every condo, affordable, military community in the database. You might see a different view and keep a few more good sales folks.

Pros

Good compensation and health benefits.

Cons

The office environment/culture is not ideal .

Pros

If you are in a good territory you can make a lot of money!

Cons

Management micromanaged everything and even has “survey” calls to apartments after you visit to get rated which affects your commission.

Advice to Management

Focus on sales team

Pros

Class A Office building, benefits

Cons

Highly metric based rote work, no creativity

Pros

The Snacks and benefits are good. If you are interested in a career in commercial real estate, this is a good place to start for resume recognition but dont get comfortable.

Cons

Costar has eliminated the competition in many areas so this has caused Senior leadership to have inflated egos and forget about those who work for them. The changes made to Research have not only caused quality to decrease, it has also led to a micro-management culture. Instead of being the leader in real Estate information, now they are focusing on marketing, which allows them to justify the decrease in quality... information. The company just laid off 270 workers in Atlanta and DC. One group in Atlanta wasn't even given notice. They were asked to leave right after they were told. Previous layoffs have been in Chicago in 2016, Norcross, GA in 2015, San Deigo in 2017 and Columbia, MD in 2018. The company will say it's for operational efficiency, however the easiest way to reach the $3 billion dollar profit goal is to reduce the workforce. Please note, if Costar aquires a company, chances are the majority of the employees will be laid off within the following year. Senior leadership doesn't even get along. One of the heads in the Richmond office was overheard telling another manager how she was going to take everything away from another VP and his direct reports. The company also does not fairly pay their employees. Several internal hires are paid extremely less than those in similar positions. The company justifies this by saying 9% increases are standard practice. However this causes $10-20K differences in pay. There is no diversity in Senior leadership and the company does not value it. When racial slurs were left on a conference room whiteboard, the company added 32 cameras to one of two floors in the building. This floor just happened to be predominantly African American and the group given no notice before being let go. No training was done and the person was never found. There are only 2 Directors of color and only 2 females. The CEO has been going to various researchers and paying them for leaving positive reviews on Glassdoor so please take that into consideration if you read them.

Advice to Management

Instead of focusing so much on hitting $3 billion to line your pockets, take time to invest in your employees and their success. Make them feel valued, pay them fairly, diversify your leadership team and kind and considerate. Stop playing favorites and treat everyone equally. Coach and develop your teams. It costs you 6X more to find, hire and on-board externally.

Pros

I enjoyed the work and my coworkers. The office was pretty which made coming to work a joy. There's an awesome kitchen/lounge with breakfast and salad lunches, for free. It may seem like all the pros are cosmetic, but let me tell you it matters, a lot. Awesome roof-top deck with umbrella seating for lunch and a shaded area with couches for relaxing and mid-afternoon naps.

Cons

None that I can think of.

Pros

My experience with management was very positive. The managers I had were interested in what I wanted to do and where I wanted to take my career in the company. They also were very good about providing any support necessary to make sure that we were on the same page about metrics/performance. The work/life balance for this role is excellent. You are not able to take anything home so you can log out at the end of the... day and not worry about work until the next morning.

Cons

Expect 180 degree changes. While change is not always a bad thing it got to be rather exhausting after working there for over two years. The changes were not always communicated very effectively or we would only be told certain things and other pieces of information would be "pending" or coming down the pipeline. This was a little unsettling when the information we were waiting on had to do with something like... product questions which left us uninformed or performance metrics when we weren't sure how to meet new expectations.