The writing on the wall is obvious: we’re in for some rocky financial occasions, Zillow CEO Wealthy Barton predicted in a brand new interview printed Thursday.

However amongst his warnings of additional disruption within the housing market, Barton’s forecast comes with a silver lining: monetary alternative.

“I really love a storm,” Barton instructed the web site GeekWire in a wide-ranging interview that additionally touched on the well being of Zillow as an organization, the choice to shutter the iBuying platform Zillow Presents and his personal early profession. “Warren Buffett likes to say: you don’t know who’s swimming bare till the tide goes out. Lots of people (are) swimming bare proper now, getting uncovered.”

Barton stated Zillow — which held $3.4 billion in money and investments on the finish of 2022 and boasts practically 200 million month-to-month guests to its web sites — is properly ready to climate any storm, together with the banking fallout spurred alongside by the failures of Silicon Valley Financial institution and Signature which might be nonetheless unfolding now.

“A number of cruft is getting washed out to sea,” he instructed GeekWire, referring not solely to the banking whiplash but in addition rates of interest reaching 20-year highs and layoffs throughout all sectors of the financial system. “And when you’re a corporation or an organization that’s carrying a washing swimsuit and a wetsuit, you’re all good. And that’s form of how I really feel proper now.”

“I’m actually feeling higher than I’ve felt in a very long time proper now,” Barton added.

Zillow reported fourth quarter revenues of $435 million, beating most analysts’ estimates and trimming its internet losses to $72 million.

The corporate posted income 19 p.c decrease than the fourth quarter of 2021 — the identical quarter through which the corporate ended its nascent iBuying enterprise Zillow Presents, earlier than the iBuying sector started to buckle below the burden of heightened rates of interest that prompted Zillow competitor Redfin to shutter its iBuyer RedfinNow practically a yr later.

“We had been forward, fortunately, of what’s occurred within the housing market this yr,” Barton stated. “I really feel fairly good about that call.”

For the financial system at giant, Barton stated he thinks latest layoffs within the tech sector — which embody 10,000 eradicated positions at Fb guardian Meta — indicators that the true arduous occasions are nonetheless to return.

“The actual ache might be coming,” he stated. “All organizations must be ready for that.”

Barton stated he relishes the chance to guide throughout powerful occasions, wanting again at his profession in tech that has included co-founding the journey big Expedia,  the corporate critiques website Glassdoor and the journey pictures web site Trover.

“The stuff that I actually love essentially the most is once I’m deep within the trenches in a disaster scenario with a workforce of individuals I like and we’re doing one thing essential,” he stated.

Barton drew a comparability to the “swing” pulled off by the College of Washington’s males’s crew workforce within the 1936 Olympics — who narrowly defeated Germany and Italy although the chances had been stacked in opposition to them to deliver residence a gold medal — to explain the sensation of efficiently main a enterprise via uneven waters.

“It simply looks like magic and it feels easy and you’re feeling euphoric,” he instructed GeekWire.

Talking of his work mentoring younger entrepreneurs, Bartson stated he tries to behave as a “ballast weight” throughout good occasions and dangerous.

“You realize, this too shall go. We’ll get via this,” he tells his mentees. “Do the appropriate factor, talk clearly, don’t conceal something, get it on the market, get the appropriate individuals round you, and you’ll make it via.”

The simplest leaders are happiest throughout powerful occasions, in keeping with Barton.

“I really assume in stormy climate, it’s when leaders are the happiest,” he stated. “It’s when the worth of what we do as leaders is excessive.”

E mail Ben Verde