Move files amended complaint in suit against CoStar

The Move–CoStar battle is heating up as Move, the parent company of Realtor.com, filed an amended complaint on Friday in its suit against the Homes.com parent company and James Kaminsky, a former Realtor.com employee who is now an editor at Homes.com.

In the suit, Move alleges that in January 2024, Kaminsky — who was laid off from Realtor.com, where he led the company’s “News & Insights” team for nearly a decade — stole trade secrets from his former employer to help fuel the rapid growth of CoStar’s Homes.com, where he was hired in March 2024.

According to the suit, Kaminsky’s role at Realtor.com gave him “knowledge of nearly every facet of the business, including strategy, financial investment and results, organizational structure, and operational details — all information that would be highly valuable to a business competitor focused on increasing its website traffic.”

Additionally, Realtor.com claims that its “News & Insights” platform “differentiates it from its competitors, drives user traffic to Realtor.com, and maintains that traffic over time.”

Kaminsky’s role at CoStar is described on his LinkedIn page as an editor at Homes.com, where he manages and supervises a team of 10 employees. Move alleges that Kaminsky is running Homes.com’s “Insights” tab, but CoStar CEO Andy Florance has claimed that Kaminsky is a “relatively junior employee writing descriptions of condominium buildings in New York City.”

The complaint states that Kaminsky’s LinkedIn account describes him as a “‘Content Strategist,’ ‘Senior Editorial Director,’ ‘Team Leader,’ and ‘Brand Builder.’”

“While CoStar’s CEO asserted Mr. Kaminsky is a junior employee and Mr. Kaminsky’s LinkedIn profile labels his roles and experience as senior, the General Counsel of CoStar stated recently that Mr. Kaminsky is a ‘mid-level manager,’” the complaint states.

“There is no doubt his position at CoStar involves creating and editing content for a residential real estate listings website, for the purpose of driving traffic to that website, and that the trade secret documents misappropriated from Move relate to its business of creating and editing content for a residential real estate listings website for the purpose of driving traffic to its website.”

In light of the lawsuit, CoStar has placed Kaminsky on leave.

In June 2024, Move discovered that Kaminsky had continued to access “Move’s confidential and trade secret information without authorization” after being laid off from Realtor.com.

“Such information, in the hands of a competitor, provides a massive unfair advantage to CoStar as it builds its content offerings,” the complaint states. “The valuable information relates to business strategy, employee lists and contact information, employee salary information, internal budgeting, industry contact lists, third party collaborations, publication subjects, publishing schedules, assignments, financial analyses, and a vast array of other competitively sensitive and valuable information regarding Move’s Realtor.com business. Mr. Kaminsky spied on Move’s confidential documents at least 37 times after CoStar hired him.”

According to the filing, Kaminsky only stopped accessing the documents after a Move employee discovered him in an allegedly confidential Move filing in real time, at which point Move blocked him from accessing the documents.

“Mr. Kaminsky’s accessing and viewing the misappropriated Move information is plainly within the scope of his employment by CoStar as a content editor for Homes.com. Mr. Kaminsky’s unlawful conduct — accessing and viewing a competitor’s confidential electronic files and trade secret information relating to the business of creating content for an established residential real estate portal (Realtor.com) while simultaneously working to create content for another residential real estate portal (Homes.com) — was an outgrowth of his employment with CoStar,” the complaint states.

“Mr. Kaminsky’s conduct was not just incidental to CoStar’s business but went to the heart of an important business objective at CoStar and his role at CoStar — namely, the creation of quality content to drive website traffic to a residential real estate listings website. The files and information accessed by Mr. Kaminsky would surely benefit and aid CoStar’s high-priority objective of creating quality content and increasing online traffic to Homes.com,“ the complaint added.

The complaint also alleges that Kaminsky committed “promissory fraud” by breaching “multiple promises” he made in his contract with Move. This includes that upon his departure from the firm, he return all materials belonging to Move.

“That promise was knowingly false and made to induce Move’s reliance on Mr. Kaminsky’s false promises,” the filing states. “When he made those promises, Mr. Kaminsky was already actively accessing Move’s documents without authorization and had set up a system that would give him future unauthorized access to Move’s electronic files. Mr. Kaminsky also violated federal and state anti-computer fraud laws by accessing without authorization Move electronic documents stored on protected computer systems.”

Move is asking for compensatory, statutory, exemplary and punitive damages, and permanent injunctive relief “enjoining CoStar Group, Inc., and James Kaminsky from further using or disclosing Move’s trade secrets and confidential information and to return all of the same to Move,” along with costs and expenses.

Gene Boxer, general counsel for CoStar Group, responded to amended complaint in a statement to HousingWire.

“Move’s case is moving. Backwards. Under threat of sanctions, Move has now withdrawn its core allegation: that CoStar is using Move’s trade secrets to build a rival news product to compete against Move,“ Boxer wrote.

“We have stated from the beginning that Move’s case against CoStar was a PR stunt. Move’s retreat proves our point. Move has tried to bully a dedicated and long-serving employee, and use the courts to distract from the fact that it is losing against CoStar in the marketplace. More often than not, bullies take flight when confronted. That’s what’s happening here. But CoStar will not stop until Move is held fully to account.”