Forty-five thousand.
That is roughly how many homes came back onto the market in January 2026 after being pulled off it, according to Redfin data reported by Scotsman Guide, the highest January relisting count since the company started tracking it in 2016. In December alone, 112,788 homes were delisted. Most of those owners did not change their minds about selling. They changed their minds about how.
That is the entire case for calling expireds, and it is why every agent in your market is calling them, which is why the homeowner you are about to dial has heard some version of the same opener a dozen times since Monday. A script for that call has two jobs. The first is to not be the thirteenth identical voice. The second, and it comes before the first, is to make sure you are allowed to place the call at all.
Almost nobody writing about expired scripts mentions the second job. So that is where this starts.
Before the script: which expireds you may call
An expired listing tells you a homeowner wanted to sell. It does not tell you that you may phone them about it.
The reason is in how the federal rules define the relationship that would let you call a number on the National Do-Not-Call Registry. An established business relationship is “a prior or existing relationship formed by a voluntary two-way communication between a person or entity and a residential subscriber,” based on the subscriber’s “purchase or transaction with the entity” within the prior eighteen months or an “inquiry or application” to the entity within the prior three months (47 CFR 64.1200(f)(5)). Read the phrase “with the entity” twice. The homeowner had a relationship with their listing broker. They have no relationship with you. Their expired listing gives you exactly as much standing to call a registered number as it gives a roofing company.
The rule itself is blunt. A telemarketing call to a residential number on the registry is prohibited unless the caller has “the subscriber’s prior express invitation or permission,” which “must be evidenced by a signed, written agreement,” or unless the caller “has a personal relationship with the recipient” (47 CFR 64.1200(c)(2)). The National Association of Realtors puts it in plain terms on its telemarketing guidance page: you may not call a FSBO or expired homeowner whose number is on the registry when the purpose of the call is to offer to list their property.
So, before a script is worth anything, four things have to be true about the number in front of you.
It has been scrubbed against the National Registry, and recently, because registrations change. It is not on your own internal do-not-call list, which you are required to keep and honor. You are inside permitted calling hours for the homeowner’s local time, which is not the same as yours if the owner has moved. And your state has not added a rule of its own on top of the federal ones, which several have.
None of this is legal advice, the obligations sit with you and your broker, and the RealDialer compliance guide covers the controls in depth. The platform can scrub, check hours, and hold your internal list. It cannot decide for you whether the call is one you should make. I would rather you skipped a number you were unsure about than wrote the world’s best opener and delivered it to someone who had asked, in writing, not to hear it.
Once a number clears that gate, you are dealing with a homeowner. Here is what they are thinking.
What the person on the other end already believes
They believe the listing failed, and on some level they believe they failed with it. The house did not sell. The photos went up, the neighbors noticed, the sign came down. That is an embarrassment before it is a transaction.
They believe their agent let them down, or they believe the price was fine and the market let them down, and which of those they believe changes everything about what you can say.
And they believe, correctly, that you are one of many. By the second morning after expiration, some of them have heard from more agents than they heard from buyers in six months. Every one of those agents was confident. Every one had a plan. Most opened by asking whether the home was still for sale, which the homeowner finds faintly insulting, since they know perfectly well that you know it is not.
Your script does not have to overcome all of that. It has to fail to add to it.
The script
This is a permission-based opener for a homeowner you have never spoken to, whose listing expired recently, whose number has cleared the gate above. It runs about forty seconds if they let you finish, which they will not always do. Use your own name, your own brokerage, and the actual address.
Hi, is this the homeowner at 14 Maple Court? My name is [your name], I’m with [your brokerage] here in town. I’ll be honest about why I’m calling. I saw the listing on Maple come off the market this week without selling, and I imagine you’ve had a few of these calls already, so I’ll keep it short. I’m not calling to tell you what went wrong. I’m calling to ask one question, and if the answer’s no I’ll thank you and let you go. Is selling still something you want to do this year?
Then stop talking.
If the answer is yes, in any form, you have earned a second question, and only one:
Okay. Then can I ask what you think happened? Not what the agent said. What you think.
And then you listen for as long as they talk, because what they say next is the listing appointment, the pricing conversation, and the objection handling all at once, and you will not get it again.
Why every line is there
“Is this the homeowner at 14 Maple Court?” You are confirming you have the right person, which you are supposed to do, and you are opening with their house rather than your name. Their attention goes to the address. Yours would too.
“I’ll be honest about why I’m calling.” You are about to say the thing they already know, which is that you saw the listing expire. Saying it plainly costs you nothing and separates you from the callers who pretended to be checking on availability.
“I imagine you’ve had a few of these calls already.” This is the most important sentence in the script and the one most agents cannot bring themselves to say. It names the thing that is making them want to hang up. Once it is named, it has less power. It also tells them you are aware of their morning, which almost nobody who has called them has been.
“I’m not calling to tell you what went wrong.” Every other caller is. Many of them lead with it, as though the homeowner is waiting for a stranger’s diagnosis of their own house. Taking that off the table in advance is a relief, and relief is what buys you the next ten seconds.
“One question, and if the answer’s no I’ll thank you and let you go.” You are handing them the exit before they reach for it. People who are given a way out tend not to take it immediately. People who are not given one take it in the first eight seconds.
“Is selling still something you want to do this year?” Not “are you still interested in selling,” which invites a reflexive no. The question is about their goal, not your service. “This year” gives it a horizon they can answer honestly. A yes here is a real yes.
“What do you think happened? Not what the agent said.” You are asking them to tell you their theory, and you are explicitly separating it from the previous agent’s, which gives them permission to disagree with a professional. Homeowners have opinions about why their house did not sell. Almost none of them have been asked. The ones who blame the price will tell you. The ones who blame the agent will tell you. Both are useful, and neither can be scripted from your end.
The three turns it will take
You will hear one of these on most calls that get past the opener. The full expired listing objections page classifies all of them. Here is the short version of the three that arrive first.
“We’re relisting with the same agent.” Then they have made a decision and you should respect it in about two sentences. “Understood, and good luck with it. If it comes back on and off again, I’d like to be the one you call.” That is the whole response. Do not argue with a decision they have already made about a person they already know.
“We’re taking a break from selling.” Sometimes true, often a polite exit. Either way, do not push. “That makes sense after a stretch like that. Can I check in around the end of the quarter, or would you rather I didn’t?” You are asking permission for a callback, and you are giving them the option to say no. Write down exactly what they say.
“Every agent in town has called me.” Agree with them. “You’re right, and I’m one of them. The only difference I can offer is that I asked what you think happened, and I’m going to listen to the answer.” If that does not land, nothing will, and you should let them go with thanks.
What you do with the outcome
The call is not finished when it ends. It is finished when the outcome is recorded in a way that changes the next contact.
A yes with a theory about price goes into follow-up with that theory written down, in their words, so the next conversation starts from it. A callback request goes into your priority lane for the date they gave, not your rotation, because you promised. A “taking a break” gets a dated note and a gentle re-contact window they agreed to. A no is a no, and an “add me to your do-not-call list” is recorded the moment they say it, before you dial anything else.
The expired listing prospecting hub carries the thirty-day follow-up board that turns these outcomes into a schedule. On the mechanics, fresh expireds belong on single-line power dialing, because the history on the record is worth reading before the phone rings, and a fresh expired pull is shallow enough that you gain almost nothing by absorbing ring time.
Run it on twenty
Do not judge this script on three calls. Run it on twenty cleared expireds in one block, and count conversations rather than dials. Then count how many of those conversations produced a theory about why the house did not sell. If that number is above a handful, the opener is doing its job and the rest is follow-up. If it is zero, the problem is almost certainly in how you are delivering the third sentence, the one that names their morning, because that is the one that gets rushed.
And if the number never clears the gate, you never make the call. The best expired script in the world is the one you did not have to use on someone who asked not to hear it.