Termination of Listing Agreement (Mutual Release) — Maine Edition Template

Listings end early for a hundred reasons — the seller changes plans, the relationship sours, the property gets pulled for repairs, the agent changes brokerages. What matters legally is how the engagement ends. An exclusive listing is a bilateral contract: a seller who simply walks away may still owe the commission (or damages) if the broker has performed, and a broker who abandons the listing invites a procuring-cause fight later. A written mutual termination and release is the clean exit that protects both sides and creates certainty about what survives.

This 3-page Termination of Listing Agreement documents: identification of the original listing agreement (parties, property, dates); the effective termination date; mutual release of further performance obligations; the disposition of marketing — removal from MLS, syndication takedown, sign and lockbox retrieval, and return or licensing of photography (listing photos are typically the brokerage's or photographer's intellectual property — this form addresses usage rights explicitly); treatment of accrued expenses or an agreed termination fee, if any; and — most importantly — whether the protection/tail period survives. The template offers both options: full release including tail-period waiver, or a preserved tail with an attached protected-prospect list naming buyers introduced during the term, which is how brokers protect a nearly-done deal from a terminate-and-sell-direct maneuver.

The included notes cover conditional termination practices (some brokerages "withdraw" the listing from MLS while the underlying contract term continues — materially different from true termination, and this form distinguishes the two), state license-law rules on releasing listings when an agent changes brokerage, and MLS status-change timing rules. Executed by seller and the broker (not just the salesperson), consistent with the universal rule that the listing belongs to the brokerage.

About this Maine Edition: These twelve templates are drafted around the Maine Real Estate Brokerage License Act (32 M.R.S. Chapter 114) and the Maine Real Estate Commission's rules. The real estate brokerage agency, acting through its designated broker, is the contracting party on every form. Maine permits disclosed dual agency with written informed consent and also recognizes appointed agency, so the consent document covers both elections with separate duty explanations and signature blocks. The seller disclosure tracks Maine's statutory residential property disclosure headings (water supply, waste disposal, hazardous materials, known defects) and adds private-well, septic, heating-oil-tank, and shoreland-zoning items common in Maine housing stock. Electronic signatures are addressed under Maine's Uniform Electronic Transactions Act, and the statute of frauds is flagged in the addendum and counteroffer commentary. No association forms are reproduced.