Real estate listing video script, with word counts

A real estate listing video script is the difference between a walkthrough where you ramble and one where the buyer pictures themselves living there. Most script templates online give you phrases, not timing: nobody tells you how many words fit in a 30-second Reel. This guide does. It sets a word budget for 15, 30, 60 and 90-second videos, gives you openers that don’t start with “Hi, I’m…”, shows how each room sells the dream without promising what the house doesn’t have, and writes all four scripts word for word for one fictional house, split by room, with the word count of every line.

How many words fit in 15, 30, 60 and 90 seconds

Plan at 150 words a minute, or 2.5 words a second. It’s a calm, clear pace for walking through a house while you talk, and it’s the pace the Haus script editor uses for its reading-time estimate.

Without a camera, people read aloud faster. In the IReST study, native English speakers aged 18 to 35 read a short, unfamiliar text aloud at an average of 228 words a minute (Trauzettel-Klosinski and Dietz, 2012). In a listing video you’re walking, turning and breathing between rooms, and buyers need a moment to look. Slower wins.

Don’t talk for the whole video either. Leave about 15% of the running time without words: the first beat of the opening shot, the moves between rooms and a short end card with your name and number. That gives these budgets:

Video	Talking time	At 130 wpm	At 150 wpm	At 160 wpm
15 s	12 s	26 words	30 words	32 words
30 s	26 s	56 words	65 words	69 words
60 s	52 s	113 words	130 words	139 words
90 s	78 s	169 words	195 words	208 words

Time a test read before you trust the table. Read the 60-second script below out loud, at the pace you’d use walking through the house, with a stopwatch running. It has 130 words. If it takes about 52 seconds, you speak at 150 words a minute: use the middle column. If it takes 60 seconds, you’re closer to 130: use the left one. Your own pace is the only number that matters.

Two habits keep the counts honest:

Write numbers the way you say them. “$689,000” is one word on the page and four out loud. Every script in this guide spells numbers out, so the word count is the spoken count.
Count words the way a word counter does, by the spaces. “Walk-in” is one word, “it’s” is one word.

Script timer: how long will your script take?

Paste or type your script

Speaking pace

Slower · 130 wpmPlanning pace · 150 wpmFaster · 160 wpm

0 s of talking

0 words

15 s video
30 s video
60 s video
90 s video

Paste your script to see the time.

Talking time leaves about 15% of the video for pauses and the end card. Numbers written as digits count as one word, so spell them out for a closer estimate. Time one read aloud before you trust the result.

Meet the example: 1824 Palm Crest Drive

All four scripts are for the same fictional house, so you can see what gets cut as the video gets shorter:

1824 Palm Crest Drive, Westbrook: single story, built in 1998, on a cul-de-sac
3 bedrooms, 2 baths, 1,850 sq ft
Kitchen redone in 2023, down to the wiring: quartz counters, a five-burner gas range, an island that seats four and a walk-in pantry
Living room with 10-foot ceilings, windows on two sides, oak floors refinished this spring and a gas fireplace
Primary suite at the back of the house, with a walk-in closet, a double vanity and a walk-in shower
Saltwater pool and a covered patio, backing onto a greenbelt
Two-car garage with a 240-volt outlet for an electric car
10-minute walk to Westbrook station
Listed at $689,000, open house Saturday from 1 to 3 p.m.
Listing agent: Dana Ortiz, Crestline Realty, also fictional

Openers that don’t start with “Hi, I’m…”

The first line decides whether someone keeps watching, and your name is the least useful thing you can put there. The viewer doesn’t know you yet, but they know what they want in a house. Lead with the house and put your name at the end, next to the call to action.

Five openers that work, each written for Palm Crest Drive:

The scene: “Summer evenings in this saltwater pool, with a greenbelt behind the fence.”
The number: “Six eighty-nine for three bedrooms, a pool and eighteen fifty square feet.”
The one feature: “This kitchen was redone in twenty twenty-three, down to the wiring.”
The place: “A ten-minute walk to Westbrook station, on a cul-de-sac.”
The buyer’s question: “What does under seven hundred thousand buy in Westbrook right now? This.”

Pick the one that answers what buyers in that price range ask you first. Buyers shopping for the home they’ll settle into want to see themselves in it: open with the scene. If they ask about the commute, open with the place. If they ask “how much?”, open with the number.

Room-by-room lines: what to say in each space

A listing video has to sell the dream: whoever’s watching should picture themselves living there. The camera already shows the sofa. Your line shows the life that happens on it, and the detail that makes that life possible. Give each room one sentence, two at most: 10 to 25 words, or 4 to 10 seconds of talking.

The formula is scene plus detail: “Morning coffee on the covered patio: saltwater pool in front, greenbelt behind the fence.” The scene puts the viewer on that patio. The detail makes them believe it, and it’s what sets this house apart from the other twenty they scrolled past today.

Room	The scene that sells	The detail that backs it
Front of the house	Pulling into a quiet street after work	Beds, baths, size, street or area
Living room	Lazy Sundays in the light, a fire on a cold night	Ceiling height, windows, floors and their age, fireplace
Kitchen	Moving in and cooking the same night, nothing to redo	Renovation year, counters, range, seating
Primary bedroom	Sleeping in, with no street noise	Where it sits, the closet
Bathroom	No waiting for the sink on a workday morning	Vanity, shower or tub
Outdoor space	Saturday morning coffee on the patio, a swim after work	Pool, shade, what’s behind it
Garage	Leaving every morning on a full charge	Spaces, outlets, storage

Three checks keep the dream standing:

The scene alone fits any listing. “Your private retreat” and “an entertainer’s dream” show up in half the listings in your feed. With a detail, the same idea belongs to this house alone: “Friday dinner on the covered patio, with nothing but greenbelt behind the fence.”
Only sell the dream the house delivers. If the seller hasn’t confirmed the pool is heated, don’t sell a swim in March. If the HOA or the city hasn’t confirmed that the greenbelt stays open space, don’t promise that nobody will ever build back there. A buyer who comes to the showing and can’t find the scene from the video doesn’t come back.
Sell the life, not the buyer. “A guest room and an office” is about the house. “Perfect for empty nesters” is about who should buy it, which is exactly what Fair Housing advertising rules warn against. Write scenes that any buyer could step into.

For a condo, swap the rooms, not the method: trade the pool and garage for the view, the balcony and the building, with its elevator, gym, parking space and HOA fee.

Closing and call to action

End with one thing to do, and make it easy:

One action, one channel. “Text me” beats “call, email, DM me or visit my website.”
A time beats an invitation. “Open house Saturday, one to three” gives people a date. “Reach out anytime” gives them nothing to act on.
Your name goes here. Say it once, at the end. In Haus the video can close on a 3-second end card, Final transition, with your logo, name and phone number, so “text me” is enough: the number is on screen.
Put the legal lines on screen, not in the script. Your state’s license law decides what an ad must show, such as your brokerage name or license number, and on an end card it’s there for anyone watching on mute. Check your state’s advertising rule. If the video is headed for the MLS, check its rules first: many MLSs call for a version without your branding or a call to action.

The full scripts: 15, 30, 60 and 90 seconds

Each line is labeled with the room it goes with, as the rooms are named in Haus, and its word count. The 15 and 30-second versions are narration over the rooms. The 60 and 90-second versions end with you on camera.

The 15-second script (30 words)

Three rooms, one line each. At 150 words a minute every line takes under 5 seconds, which is the default clip length for each room in Haus.

Facade (7 words): “Six eighty-nine for three bedrooms in Westbrook.”
Kitchen (11 words): “This kitchen was redone in twenty twenty-three, down to the wiring.”
Pool (12 words): “Summer evenings in this saltwater pool. Open house Saturday, one to three.”

Use it for Stories, WhatsApp status or a teaser before the open house.

The 30-second script (65 words)

Facade (12 words): “Six eighty-nine for three bedrooms, two baths and eighteen fifty square feet.”
Living Room (8 words): “Lazy Sundays in the light from two sides.”
Kitchen (11 words): “Move in and cook: the kitchen was redone in twenty twenty-three.”
Bedroom (10 words): “Sleep in: the primary suite is away from the street.”
Pool (11 words): “Coffee by a saltwater pool, with a greenbelt behind the fence.”
Pool, closing (13 words): “Open house Saturday, one to three, or text me for a private showing.”

Use it for Reels and TikTok, where you want people to stay to the end.

The 60-second script (130 words)

Facade (18 words): “Eighteen twenty-four Palm Crest Drive: a single-story home in Westbrook, three bedrooms, two baths, eighteen fifty square feet.”
Living Room (16 words): “Lazy Sundays in the light: ten-foot ceilings, windows on two sides, oak floors refinished this spring.”
Kitchen (23 words): “Move in and cook the same night: the kitchen was redone in twenty twenty-three, down to the wiring, with a five-burner gas range.”
Bedroom (13 words): “Sleep in: the primary suite is at the back, away from the street.”
Bathroom (11 words): “Two sinks and a walk-in shower: no waiting on workday mornings.”
Pool (14 words): “Morning coffee on the covered patio: saltwater pool in front, greenbelt behind the fence.”
Garage (11 words): “A full charge every morning: the garage has a two-forty outlet.”
On camera, closing (24 words): “It’s listed at six hundred eighty-nine thousand. Open house is Saturday, one to three, or text me and I’ll show you around this week.”

This is the main listing video: Reels, TikTok, YouTube Shorts and the listing page.

The 90-second script (195 words)

Facade (20 words): “Eighteen twenty-four Palm Crest Drive, on a cul-de-sac in Westbrook. Single story, three bedrooms, two baths, eighteen fifty square feet.”
Entrance (11 words): “Coat closet on your left, then straight into the living room.”
Living Room (25 words): “Lazy Sundays in the light: ten-foot ceilings, windows on two sides, oak floors refinished this spring. Cold night? The gas fireplace starts with a switch.”
Kitchen (28 words): “Move in and cook the same night: the kitchen was redone in twenty twenty-three, down to the wiring, with a five-burner gas range. The pantry is a walk-in.”
Bedroom (17 words): “Sleep in: the primary suite is at the back, away from the street, with a walk-in closet.”
Bathroom (11 words): “Two sinks and a walk-in shower: no waiting on workday mornings.”
Bedroom, second and third (18 words): “A guest room and an office: the other two bedrooms each fit a queen bed and a desk.”
Pool (14 words): “Morning coffee on the covered patio: saltwater pool in front, greenbelt behind the fence.”
Garage (12 words): “A full charge every morning: the two-car garage has a two-forty outlet.”
On camera, closing (39 words): “Westbrook station is a ten-minute walk. It’s listed at six hundred eighty-nine thousand, and the open house is Saturday from one to three. Can’t make it Saturday? I’m Dana Ortiz. Text me, and I’ll show you around this week.”

Use the 90-second version where people chose to watch: your website, YouTube, or sent straight to a buyer who asked about the area.

Look at what changes between versions. The 15-second script keeps one scene and two facts: summer evenings in the pool, the kitchen year and the price. Each longer version adds rooms, and each new room brings its scene tied to a detail the buyer can check at the showing.

Reading it without sounding like you’re reading

Read it out loud three times before you film. If you trip on a word twice, change it.
One sentence per breath. Break the text where you’d breathe, so each line on the teleprompter is one thought.
Use contractions. “It’s”, “you’ll”, “I’ll”. Written English sounds stiff out loud.
Stop a beat before the clip ends. If the clip stops mid-word, the cut sounds rushed.
On camera, look at the lens at the start and end of each sentence. Reading in the middle is fine; people expect it.

If you want to start without your face on screen at all, the guide to faceless real estate videos walks through narrating first and stepping on camera later.

How to record the script with the Haus teleprompter

Haus is a listing video app, and its teleprompter lives in the camera:

Open the script. In the camera, tap Script. Pick one of the 31 ready-made scripts, sorted into 12 tags such as Introduction, Kitchen and Closing, or tap New script and paste your own, up to 5,000 characters. The editor shows an estimated reading time based on about 150 words a minute plus pauses, the same pace as the table above.
Let the app fill in the details. Type [name], [address], [bedrooms], [bathrooms] or [parking spaces], and Haus fills them in from your Branding and the listing. The price isn’t filled in, so type it out the way you’ll say it. The address comes from the Details step, which comes after filming, so on a first take Haus usually knows only your name and the bedroom and bathroom counts.
Split it by room. Save each room’s line as its own script and pick it before each clip, or keep one script and drag it to the right line.
Give long lines more time. Each room’s clip records for 5 seconds by default and then stops by itself. That fits the 15-second script, but the kitchen line in the 60-second script (23 words) takes about 9 seconds. Tap Timer and set Max duration to 10 seconds, or to No limit.
Tap Use this script and record. The text sits at the top of the camera view and scrolls only while you record. It holds still for the first 2.5 seconds so you can read the first line. Drag it to re-read, and it starts scrolling again 1.5 seconds after you let go.
Set the speed once. The gear icon opens the Prompter settings. Speed goes from Slow to Fast and starts near the slow end; Font size goes from Small to Big without changing the pace. If you keep catching up with the text, nudge the speed up and do another take.
Keep the clip’s sound on. Your narration stays on the clip, and Haus can turn it into subtitles in Preview → Subtitles for anyone watching with the sound off.

Prefer to narrate afterwards? Record it in Preview → Audio → Record voice over, holding the button for each line, with the script printed or open on another screen next to you.

Write the script once, time it once, and reuse the structure on every listing. Download Haus and try the 30-second version on your next one.

Frequently asked questions

How many words is a 60-second real estate video script?

About 130 words at 150 words a minute. That leaves around 8 seconds for the opening shot, the moves between rooms and the end card. Read it aloud once with a stopwatch: if you speak more slowly, cut it to about 115 words.

Should I say the price in a listing video?

Usually, yes, if the listing is public and you'd say the price at a showing. A buyer who hears it and keeps watching is a better lead than one who calls only to ask. Write it the way you say it, like "six eighty-nine". In Haus, type it into the script yourself: the teleprompter fills in your name, the address and the room counts, but not the price.

Do I have to be on camera to use a script?

No. You can read it while you film the rooms with the back camera, so only your voice is in the video, or record it as a voice-over afterwards. Saying the closing line on camera, in one short clip at the end, is a good next step.

What should I say first in a listing video?

The life a buyer wants in that house, tied to a fact: "Summer evenings in this saltwater pool, with a greenbelt behind the fence." Or the strongest fact you have: the price, the one feature buyers will remember, or where the house is. Save your name for the end, next to the call to action.