Many domain investors will pay more for expired domains than ones owned by other investors.
Over the past few days, there’s been a lot of conversation on Twitter about expired domain auctions.
I believe it started with Josh Reason asking GoDaddy to allow private sellers to include their domains in the GoDaddy expired auction stream. He proposed running them like the other auctions (no reserve) but labeling them as private party on the auction page.
The closest comparison is NameJet, which lets private sellers on its platform. I think a lot of buyers are frustrated with reserve domains on NameJet, but Josh thinks as long as the domains have no reserve people don’t care if it’s an expired auction or private party seller:
I get it, but disagree.
If you have a platform of ONLY no reserve auctions that include expired and owner listed, I’m sure that people wouldn’t favor one over the other.
Buyers are conditioned to prefer expired auctions because they ALL are no reserve…
— Josh Reason | 🌐 | (@JoshuaHReason) June 25, 2019
I disagree and I know that others do, too. There are a couple of reasons that I’d prefer to buy an expiring domain than one that another domainer is trying to sell through the platform.
First, I think there’s less chance the domain has been shopped around in recent years. Less chance it’s on Sedo or Afternic. I’ve sold expired domains within weeks of buying them when someone who was watching the domain but didn’t know how expired domains work reached out. And if you add it to Afternic for the first time, some registrar partners will email customers with similar domains and let them know the domain is available.
Second, there’s at least some psychological feeling that if another domain investor is dumping a domain, perhaps it isn’t that good.
The other challenge I see to private party listings is shill bidding. It adds incentives for people to bid up domains. This is a problem NameJet recently had.
The fact that people want to get their domains in the expired auction streams at GoDaddy and NameJet says a lot. These domains tend to sell for good amounts. More than the domains would sell for if they weren’t expiring.
An interesting middle ground would be to have a separate auction stream of no reserve, private-party listings. The lists would be provided to services like ExpiredDomains.net so people could analyze them. Having a separate stream allows investors to apply whatever premium they want to domains that are expired.
I have talked to real estate investors that would buy from banks rather than individuals, that have an emotional attachment to their property.
Crazy stuff!
This cause and effect narrative regarding not buying from other domainers makes me cry, but then it makes me laugh because I can pick up domains all week long on namejet that nobody is bidding on.
– because it’s owned by a domainer, it’s been listed for sale on Afternic
– because it;s been owned by a domainer, it’s been listed for sale on Afternic with an optimum price, and not some crazy price
– because it’s owned by a domainer they are trying to get one over on the market; nothing to do with actually needing cash! lol
– because it’s an expired domain, the owner does know they have a gem on their hands
– because it’s an expired domain, they probably never listed it for sale on Afternic at a reasonable price
The list is endless! 1+1 = 2 always remember that!
never for sale domains are the way to go
If a domainer is auctioning a domain the mostly likely reason is lack of enduser interest. The people complaining about this or hoping it will change are simply holding bad domains.
Expired domains are NOT more valuable than domains that have not expired yet. Buyers (domainers and end-users) just don’t want to pay a domain owner what they want the domain. Simple as that.
So they wait for domains to expire and sometimes end up paying a premium wholesale price or an end-user price for that same domain.
You can now sometimes get a better deal by paying the sellers asking price before the domain expires goes into auction.
Gone are the days of getting a true wholesale price for domains in expired auctions.
Lots of domains that expire have been shopped around, doesn’t mean the next owner can’t sell the domain. Timing is everything.
Domainers drop domains all of the time, doesn’t mean they are all bad domains.
I think private domain listings with no reserve, should be mixed in with expired domains at GoDaddy auctions. Everyone wins!
But, too many people are depending on GoDaddy’s appraisal tool to value expired and non-expired domains.
Automated domain appraisals should not be used to appraise domains IMO.
There are just too many variables that an automated appraisal cannot factor into it’s calculation.
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i like expired domains also but once you bid, expect Huge Domains to bid also…
i always place my bid at the last second and here comes Huge Domains bidding it up $100 to $200 higher every time
they will let you win, but you will have to pay $100 to $200 more than the $12 that u were expecting to win at.
I’ll have to watch out for that. Thanks.
True, people would pay GoDaddy good money in order to auction off their domains in the expired feed. Every now and then I see domains in their expired auction list that have Namefind listed as registrant… I always wonder if these names are really expired or if GoDaddy is simply just unloading inventory and label it expired so they get more money for it. Sedo does it with DomCollect and their marketplace for “expired” domains. If we can figure out that expired domains make more money than direct listings, I guess GoDaddy and others figured it out a long time ago.
Just like Expired Domains or Other Domains Auctions, I have started using a new Sedo minimum promotional bid of just $20 now reduced from $90 with my selected domains, also together with minimum sale fee is now eliminated!
In Spain this is called the house of whores in the good sense of the word.
Happy Day. Jose.
If domainers ever got their crap names they want to drop in the expire feed it would be hell. It’s not like they would just put it there once. They would keep listing them over and over and over and over and over and over and over again for a year until they expire. It’s hard enough weeding though the current junk.
That’s another problem with NameJet, especially the reserve domains there. They should limit each domain to one time per year.
I agree, I haven’t found any filter in the past to get rid of those private listings, but maybe there is.
I know the term expired put’s a little value on the feature, but in the long run this will turn stale on the new owner, if they market it. BrandBucket and others put a fancy twist on a new creation by adding a personalized logo and a blueprint. Buying “new” is always best, unless it’s a realm-buster, cyber-whopper of a .place!
i get it but disagree