Hi Roland –

Interesting indeed! I will say first off that I am not a Realtor in California, but I have a pretty good handle on the National Association of Realtors’ stance on this topic. If the CAR and the CRMLS have a different take on this topic, I would definitely be interested in hearing it.

My guess is that the forum you referred to was speaking to the situation where a property’s LISTING has expired, but a seller’s CONTRACTUAL RELATIONSHIP with a Realtor has not. There are understandable situations when a property’s listing would expire and a Realtor would retain the exclusive right to list the property. In a case such as this, a soliciting Realtor could in fact be violating the NAR code of ethics (Article 16), and be in some legally murky waters for engaging in Tortious Interference, which essentially is interfering with a contractually legal relationship.

By design, some Expired Listing pitches involve saying something to the effect of, “I can do it better than the last person”, which also is a bad spot to be in if the “last person” is actually still the “current person”.

A great way for prospecting Realtors to avoid this issue is to make sure you ask directly whether or not the seller of your sought-after Expired Listing is still under contract with their first Realtor. If that is the case, thank them for their time and wish them the best of luck. In the past, NAR has made it clear that ignorance isn’t a defense on this topic; it is the soliciting Realtor’s responsibility to verify that they aren’t violating this rule.

If you make a reasonable effort to ascertain whether someone is currently working with an agent, and if you find out that to be the case, respond accordingly, this generally absolves you from any of these ethical concerns. To be totally clear, I am not a lawyer, so this is friendly advice, but in my experience this strategy has done the trick.

As soon as seller’s contractual relationship with a Realtor has ended, they are free to pursue (and be pursued by) another Realtor. While customs on the local level may differ, this is the generally accepted position on the topic, at least in my experience.

If this forum is publicly available, I’d love to take a look at it!

Thanks again for your comment, happy prospecting!

Chris