And there are major financial repercussions for defaulting on things like that.
Mortgages, credit cards, car loans, etc - back out of that and your phone will start ringing from collectors. Back out of student loans and the federal government will be coming after that (in the USA at least). Cant bankrupt a student loan. IRS will take any refunds prior to you seeing it and thats if DOJ hasnt already garnished the salary of those in default.
In the case where people back out of bidding on a house (for example), they forfeit what is called "earnest money"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earnest_payment So it would behoove those who are interested to be serious players.
That process has to become part of the bidding and purchase of a domain name too or else the industry will remain flush with these tire-kickers. I've had 5 non-payers this year alone.
It would be so easy to implement: In order to bid on a domain name then
require a credit card or whatever other means of down payment. Simple. All serious buyers will move forward and most tire-kickers will fall away.
The amount of money wasted in time chasing these people are enormous. For those who say its not worth it for under a certain amount, sure - it probably isnt. But when we lose $5000, $10000, or even more offers to people who are probably out just to waste our time, play games, or simply back out because they decided not to AND because there are no repercussions (even though they are in a binding legal agreement), it would make perfect sense to require a 10% deposit in order to bid. Personally, I'd have mid-4 figures in earnest money in my pocket this year so far AND a lot of time not wasted trying to chase down these people.
I am open for discussion, anyone that can see flaws in this for the domain world then lets all talk about it. Something has to change though. In the meantime, I would love to see a thread where we can post non-paying buyers information to warn other domain investors. Someplace we can look up whether or not these people are legit. I've had CEOs and founders of huge companies back out of 5 figure sales like its nothing. People worth multiple dozens of millions of dollars and in one case a billionaire (several years ago). This is BS and needs to change. Its worth discussing.