I think you should always listen to advice from people who have been there and done it.
But with Rick I don’t know, as said he contradicts himself so often, he’s the Donald Trump of domain investing, says thing one week and says the complete opposite the week after, but then will quote himself what he got right as if to say “I told you so”.
And make no mistake the ‘advice’ he gives, are for his own interests, I remember him trying to influence the market on LLL, saying people should charge more, all this is for his own benefit to make his own LLL more valuable if everyone put their prices up.
Everyone doesn’t have the same bank balance as Rick’s though, Rick is in a position where he can turn down 5/6 and even 7 figure offers without thinking twice about it, people need to do what’s best for them and their own interests without the judgement of a already millionaire saying they should have sold for more.
I think many of us, including myself, like to make excuses for our own shortcomings, and timing is mostly...an excuse. The right person, with the right business acumen and strategy could do similar things today. How many people on this thread have spent more than $5,000 on a domain? Most likely less than 1%.
Back in 2015, after investing in domains for over 10 years, a friend and I put $10,000 towards buying about 800 domains. The revenue for this $10k portfolio climbed to $30k in revenue in 2019 and this year is already at $40k with 5 months left to go in 2020.
As far as Rick, I really don't see how you say he contradicts himself. He gives a pretty clear message as a foundation and that is to extract the most value from each domain sale. Some things that he says are meant to change your way of thinking and not always to take in their exact literal sense. Take for example, his post below.
Before his post, the most I ever spent on a domain that was going to be for resale was about $2,000. Since this, I've purchased a domain for $4,250. How'd I buy it? By my partner and I selling a domain for $3,500 that we purchased for $85, just 9 months ago, then contributing an extra $375 each. My next purchase after this will be a $10,000 domain, then $20,000+, then $40,000+, etc. No credit card needed, and no debt needed.
And make no mistake the ‘advice’ he gives, are for his own interests, I remember him trying to influence the market on LLL, saying people should charge more, all this is for his own benefit to make his own LLL more valuable if everyone put their prices up.
How could you possibly know it's for some type of nefarious purpose? Maybe he simply found that there is great value in these names and wants others to know so they aren't leaving money on the table. I appreciate that he tells me not to sell a certain type of domain cheap, and I think most would much rather have 10X the sale price if they were previously ill informed. An end user looking to buy abc.com from Rick, isn't going to care what def.com sold for, so I think his personal benefit is pretty slim. Besides that, Rick has sold so much in domains that I don't think he has to worry about his income anytime soon. When someone is helping others it doesn't mean it's out of ill-will. He enjoys doing it and mentions it often.
I see people try to take credit away from him by saying it was somehow easier for him because of timing. Did you know for his largest sale, that he bought the domain for $42,000 in 1997? Parking was not even a popular thing in that year. I would suspect very few people on here have purchased a domain for $42,000. For Candy(dot)com he paid $108k, property(dot)com $750k, properties(dot)com $61k, at least 7 others in the $10k-100k range, and several more he paid $5-$7k each. He took a risk with each of those investments, and while that may have been funded by earlier domain sales, can we not do the same thing today? I just sold a domain (PlanToGrow(dot)com) in March for $24,500 that I paid $19.47 for in 2016. So do we somehow not have the same opportunity? If I would have taken that $24,500 and invested it in 1 domain for $20,000 I'm fairly sure it would be an ultra-premium capable of a $1 million+ sale. If not, once I purchased one in the $40-50k range, it would be for sure.