Why does it have to be end-user or reseller?

Are you talking about this forum?

Well, if you ask me, I've seen here "resellers" who want to pay far less than the reseller price and "resellers" trying to sell here far beyond the end-user price.

When your domain is priced $XXX and has 100 or more offer page views who do you think is looking? How many end users can there be for that name?

Kuffy said:

It seems that many domainers expect to pick up names at reseller prices, and they expect those to be 10% of end-user prices. How about trying some prices in between - perhaps we could call the halfway point "investment prices".

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You can always start paying top dollar. If you did not waste your money on weed already

Because that is a sellers POV, not a buyers.
Sellers = sell for as much as possible
Buyers = buy for as little as possible

Something has to give, and I don't disagree with your statement, it would be a little more fair, but such is life and business. Something you buy at around $100 that is 10% predicted potential resale value has a fair risk that it'll take a while to sell, and maybe never at the expected $1000. The lower the purchase price the higher the potential ROI and thus less risk of a loss too.

I expect you knew that, of course, but just pointing it out. If I can buy a name for $50 rather than $250 I will - that's just good business. On the other hand, if you think the name I offered you $50 for is worth $2500, then you shouldn't be selling it to me for $50 (unless you were desperate for a sale/cash). If it was truly worth $2.5k to end user and a decent enough name (ie easy to sell not rare etc) then reseller should be low to mid 3 figures at least.

Don't forget to haggle up when selling

garptrader said:

When your domain is priced $XXX and has 100 or more offer page views who do you think is looking? How many end users can there be for that name?

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I might misunderstand, but if the offer page is also a landing page, it may simply mean people find the term popular, not necessarily (unless there are offers, not just views) there are multiple potential purchasers.

If your talking about this forum being offered 10% of an end user price is not common. People are pretty cheap here. I don’t really consider this a place to sell but a goldmine for buyers.

It always amazes me how low people want to pay for names here. You can’t get a good dropping name at the big places for less than $50 to $500 bucks (and up)

You can’t haggle out there but here you are expected to give your names away for cost or less ! I only answer a very few requests here anymore— most are just fishing or act like they are doing you a favor.

If it’s outside this forum set your minimum and if the name is good they will find it.

I think I'm going to invent an investment price. This will be for a name that can be added to a portfolio, and will earn some money while it waiting to be sold. I'm not sure how to value it though. Do you base it on income, and expect a return of ( say ) 10%?

Kuffy said:

I think I'm going to invent an investment price. This will be for a name that can be added to a portfolio, and will earn some money while it waiting to be sold. I'm not sure how to value it though. Do you base it on income, and expect a return of ( say ) 10%?

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No there is no such thing as an investment price, there is a ton of options and people want to buy at ridiculously low prices and sell at ridiculously high prices. Semantics don't matter, most are looking for desperate people, someone in a jam or too lacking in experience to know what they actually own.

There are exceptions, but usually only when it comes to names with an established market outside of what anyone here thinks. There are liquid names stuff with an active market, most domainers here don't own those names.

So when you say you want a 3L.com for $5,000 people laugh in your face, ignore you and sometimes block you. But when someone says they are looking for a crypto related brandable for example, what's the reseller price ? the end user price? Was someone going to offer $50,000 for CryptoWorld.com? No they would have acted like they were doing the seller if he was not of Mike Mann's (actual seller) experience, a favor with I'll give you $1,500 bro. @karmaco had a beautiful line that summed things up perfectly, "I don’t really consider this a place to sell but a goldmine for buyers."

As much as some love to compare domains to real estate or stocks, it's neither. In the stock market GoDaddy has a value it's $55.78 a share. If someone said equity I will sell you some GoDaddy shares at $5.57, there would never be a case where I would not purchase those shares.

But in domaining, I have had people of means, so they are not broke and starving, say oh example.com I value that at $5,000, Cool I will sell it to you right now for $500 (because the name means little to me) Oh thanks bro but I am not interested. Really you are not interested at 10% of your stated value, not mine, not estibot, not GoDaddy? No bro I am just not interested.

It's still the wild west, many prefer it that way and on a domain forum it's the height of the wild west.

If you want to get a true market or investment price, start an auction at $1 no reserve and see where the pricing takes you.

At the end of the day you have arrive at a price that makes sense for both parties. If their price does not match your price, then move along.

If someone is willing to take on the risk of owning a domain asset at a premium price, and it nets you a profit you are happy with, then take it.

If you fell like you are being low balled and you can sell it in a time frame that makes financial sense to hold it for (x) months or (x) years, then don't sell it.

Everyone has their "Line";
Domainers: I'm a reseller

Corporations: My SEO guy says it's worth $50 USD

End-Users: I am a 145 year old sea-merchant looking to blog about my personal hobby; diamonds. I can pay $100 for Diamonds.com.

I liked the idea that somebody posted in another thread. He picked up names for under $10 including the renewal fee, and he put a mini-site on the domain. He offered the whole package for $195 or more. If you can pick up $10-$20 per year in revenue ( or possibly more ), then you have got a handy investment, and there is no pressure to under-sell.

Unfortunately there has to be a sizeable difference between acquisition price and resale price.
We are in an industry with low liquidity. A 2% turnover is considered normal and even good. It means 2% of your portfolio has to pay for the maintenance of the remaining 98% (and generate a healthy profit). Think about it.

So we cannot afford to pay 50% of expected retail price. Not for every domain.
Keep in mind that:

• the vast majority of registered domain names will never sell - failure is the norm
  
• most domainers are losing money, even while being stingy. But the problem is not being stingy, it's more about the choice of domains.
  
• even if you buy good domains at a good price, you may have to wait for a long time to maximize your investment
• in the end you have a lot of money tied up in assets that most of the time are unproductive (ie not making any real money on PPC)

How do you offset that ? Buy low sell high.

The so-called median price only works for certain types of domains.
For instance I have bought LL.cctld or LLL.com knowing that I could sell them for double or triple in a relatively short time frame. Then I effectively paid 33% of 50% of retail price, knowing I was purchasing exceptionally liquid domains.

I couldn't have said it better than Kate.

Unless a domain is highly liquid like an LLL.com, there needs to be a large gap between re-seller and end user pricing when you consider the low average turnover. Even great terms in .COM are not fast sellers for end user prices.

Brad

Kuffy said:

How about trying some prices in between - perhaps we could call the halfway point "investment prices".

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NP already has this. its called Hobbyist in the Pro Appraisal section.

Kate hit the nail on the head.

I can understand Kate's point, but I think it's a split that we have created. Jewellery retailing is another high markup, low turnover business. However, the average markup is around 100%. and there is little prospect of earning revenue from unsold stock.

"Hobbyist" names are names that people keep because they are related to hobbies or interests. I turned down £2,000 for HotRat.com because I am interested in the cars. I was probably stupid, because I haven't done anything with the name.

Low values seem to be an expectation in many people trying to buy names. I've just had an offer of $20 for one of my financial names, and I suspect this is from an end user (possibly a law firm). It's a name that I like, and another one that I want to use for political purposes. I would estimate the values to be in the £x,xxx range. I might respond with a £9,500 price and see what happens. At the moment the name is parked, so I should probably put a mini-site on it before I reply.

NP is rarely for max value sales and that is normal. As for any wholesaler group, its ultimate usefulness is in providing liquidity and keep cash flowing.

The higher the liquidity of the asset class, the less the ratio between the max value and the reseller price.