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Escrow.com reports record results in Q1

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Domain name transactions help push Escrow.com to its second consecutive quarterly record.

Graph showing Escrow.com domain name volume over time, with $110 million in Q1 2021

Escrow.com handled $110 million of domain and website transactions in the first quarter of 2021.

Escrow.com released its quarterly Domain Investment Index (pdf) today, and parent company Freelancer.com released its quarterly results last week.

Total domain name transactions in Q1 2021 were $110 million, up from about $94 million in the last quarter of 2020 and $86 million in the first quarter of 2020.

The company says it handled a record number of large domain name portfolio purchases during the quarter.

The median price of a domain transacted at Escrow.com last quarter was $3,333.

Overall, gross payment volume at Escrow.com hit a record for the second quarter in a row at USD $158.2 million, up 44% compared to the first quarter of last year. The difference between total payments and domain payments is accounted for by transactions for cars, watches, personal protective equipment and other goods.

Escrow.com passed the $5 billion total payments milestone during the first quarter of the year.

 

Online escrow companies add new features

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Escrow.com and Payoneer Escrow announce new features.

Two online escrow companies popular among domain name investors have added new features.

Escrow.com released a new plugin for WooCommerce. It allows the two million WooCommerce users to add Escrow.com payments as a payment option.

The company plans to build additional plugins for online store platforms.

Payoneer Escrow has also added new features.

Payoneer Buy-It-Now buttons are now available. Domain owners can create a button and insert it on a landing page, allowing a visitor to start a transaction to buy the domain name at a fixed price.

The company also introduced domain holding transactions that let buyers pay for a domain name over time.

Escrow.com drops minimum fee to $10

by — Services 13 Comments

Small transactions are now cheaper at Escrow.com.

Escrow.com is dropping its minimum fee on transactions to $10.

This will lower the price customers pay for the standard service for any transaction under $775. It will lower the price for transactions using a credit card under $400.

Escrow.com GM told Domain Name Wire that this move was made to compete with PayPal. “This will give people escrow protection without the need to pay $25 on a $300 domain,” he said. “$10 makes it a no-brainer.”

Payoneer, a competing escrow service, also has a $10 minimum.

Domain name escrow price and services guide

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A comparison of popular domain name escrow options.

The domain name escrow landscape has changed in recent years. Escrow.com is under new ownership, Payoneer has added a service and some escrow services have closed.

With this in mind, I spent some time comparing the services based on features, payment options and fees.

I limited my analysis to Escrow.com, Payoneer and Escrow.domains (the latter being a legal service of Greenberg & Lieberman). You might consider other services for secure domain transactions including those offered by Sedo and Afternic.

Each escrow service has different fees both for the overall transaction and the methods of payment. Here’s a comparison: Click to continue reading…

Want to use Escrow.com? Prepare to be verified.

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New verification process is designed to meet regulations.

Escrow.com has started a new verification process for its customers, both buyers and sellers.

In order to send or receive payments to a personal account, users will have to provide a copy of a government-issued ID (such as a drivers license) and proof of personal address (such as a utility bill).

Businesses will need to provide a copy of a representative’s government issued ID, proof of address of that representative, and company registration documents.

This will no doubt add friction to the process of buying and selling domain names, particularly if the other party is not a frequent domain trader.

But the verification is necessary for Escrow.com to not run afoul of government regulations. Escrow.com GM Jackson Elsegood wrote on NamePros:

To combat the funding of terrorism and money laundering activities, US Federal law requires all financial institutions (including escrow companies) to obtain, verify and record information that identifies each person who opens an account. This requirement is present in many pieces of legislation, but the strongest requirement comes from FinCEN and the US PATRIOT Act, section 326. You can find more information about the US PATRIOT Act and it’s requirements on the US FinCEN site.

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