Last year, DNJournal recorded more than $26 million worth of sales in their "Top 100 Reported Sales" table, lead by six deals valued at $1 million or more. It's can be interesting to revisit past sales, especially high-value sales, to see exactly what the name is now being used for and whether it was an investor or an end user that picked up the name.
In this article, we're going to take a look at the top ten sales listed by DNJournal from last year
Fly.com - $2.89 million
After acquiring Fly.com for $1.76 million in 2009, Travelzoo sold the name eight years later for a total of $2.89 million to Fly Holdings, LLC. The sale, discovered in an SEC filing by George Kirikos (@GeorgeK), was the largest of 2017 by a grand total of $890,000.
Since its acquisition, the domain has been developed into a fully-fledged flight search engine, having featured in publications such as Time Magazine, The New York Times and USA Today. The name also currently has an Alexa ranking of just under 59,000 in the USA.
ETH.com - $2 million
Last year saw the continued popularity of cryptocurrency, with ETH becoming the second most popular coin, rising to around the $1,000 mark by the end of 2017.
In June 2017, broker @Sharjil Saleem announced that he had successfully brokered the sale of ETH.com. At the time, the price wasn’t disclosed, but DNJournal later revealed the price to be $2 million.
For a long time, the domain sat unused, but relatively recently the name has started to display a MyEtherWallet.com website. It’s unclear as to whether the name is owned by MyEtherWallet since ETH.com remains under privacy protection.
Freedom.com - $2 million
Another $2 million sale from 2017 was closed by @Ali Zandi of Starfire Holdings and was revealed on an episode of @DomainSherpa, in which Ali shares as many details on the sale as possible.
The name was acquired for $2 million by Freedom Mortgage Corporation, who are redirecting Freedom.com to their established FreedomMortgage.com domain name.
01.com - $1.82 million
Two-number .COM domains have been an attractive prospect for Chinese investors in particular, with Chinese registrants accounting for at least 27% of two-number .COM domains, according to the Q2 2018 report by GGRG.
The second-largest publicly disclosed two-number .COM sale of all time was closed in 2017 by VIP Brokerage. The name, 01.com, sold for $1.82 million to a Chinese buyer. It is currently not resolving.
20.com - $1.75 million
The second two-number .COM domain on our list was owned by serial entrepreneur @Jason Calacanis, who bought the name in 2006 for $75,000. Although Jason revealed that he previously received offers in the $2million to $3 million range, he cashed in at $1.75 million with the help of broker @Joe Uddeme.
The name currently hosts a Chinese domain marketplace, with a number of liquid names available through the platform.
MyWorld.com - $1.2 million
Seeing a two-word .COM domain sell for seven-figures is a rare event, but broker Larry Fischer (@changejobs) managed to achieve this feat on behalf of the seller, Anything.com.
The name, which sold for $1.2 million, was acquired by myWorld Solutions, an Austrian company with a wide range of product marketing and management services. MyWorld.com currently hosts the company’s corporate homepage.
VPN.com - $976,730
The sales price of VPN.com was only confirmed in July 2018 after a press release from the domain’s owner. The new owner, Michael Gargiulo, also took part in an interesting @DomainSherpa interview that describes how he negotiated the acquisition and subsequently developed the name.
Michael reportedly spent over $2 million on developing the name, and VPN.com now displays a site dedicated to virtual private networks (VPN).
Purple.com - $900,000
Purple.com is one of a handful of domains to have its own Wikipedia page, describing the domain as hosting a single-page website created in 1994. According to Wikipedia, it was notable as being the oldest known single-serving site.
However, in November 2017, former owner Jeff Abrahamson confirmed that he sold the name. The price wasn’t disclosed until March 2018 when George Kirikos (@GeorgeK) discovered the sale in an SEC filing from Purple Innovations LLC.
The domain now hosts the homepage of Purple, a mattress company that was founded in 2015 and merged with Global Partner Acquisition Corp. in July 2017 in a deal that valued the company at $1.1 billion.
SW.com - $660,000
The only two-letter .COM name on our list is SW.com. This name was part of the RightOfTheDot.com NamesCon 2017 auction but failed to sell at the event. With help from broker Sharjil Saleem, RightOfTheDot closed the sale some weeks later for $660,000.
Despite some obvious potential end users such as South Western Airlines, the name was sold to a Chinese investor. As of writing, the domain fails to resolve.
Lola.com - $550,000
Our tenth and final name of the list is Lola.com, which sold for $550,000 in a bankruptcy auction for BCBG Max Azria. Launched by BCBG Max Azria in 2011, Lola was the company’s secondary fashion label, but by 2017 the company was looking to offload the name.
The domain was acquired by Lola Travel Company, Inc. of Boston, MA, a business travel service founded in 2015. Months before acquiring the name, Lola secured a $25 million Series B funding round. The domain currently hosts the company’s main website.
Place.com - $550,000
There is technically an eleventh entry on our list since Lola.com and Place.com were tied on $550,000. Unfortunately, there's very little to tell about Place.com. It sold in May 2017 in a deal co-brokered by RightOfTheDot.com and GoDaddy. As of writing, the name displays a simple landing page with no indication of who owns the name. The WHOIS listing gives no clues either.
In this article, we're going to take a look at the top ten sales listed by DNJournal from last year
Fly.com - $2.89 million
After acquiring Fly.com for $1.76 million in 2009, Travelzoo sold the name eight years later for a total of $2.89 million to Fly Holdings, LLC. The sale, discovered in an SEC filing by George Kirikos (@GeorgeK), was the largest of 2017 by a grand total of $890,000.
Since its acquisition, the domain has been developed into a fully-fledged flight search engine, having featured in publications such as Time Magazine, The New York Times and USA Today. The name also currently has an Alexa ranking of just under 59,000 in the USA.
ETH.com - $2 million
Last year saw the continued popularity of cryptocurrency, with ETH becoming the second most popular coin, rising to around the $1,000 mark by the end of 2017.
In June 2017, broker @Sharjil Saleem announced that he had successfully brokered the sale of ETH.com. At the time, the price wasn’t disclosed, but DNJournal later revealed the price to be $2 million.
For a long time, the domain sat unused, but relatively recently the name has started to display a MyEtherWallet.com website. It’s unclear as to whether the name is owned by MyEtherWallet since ETH.com remains under privacy protection.
Freedom.com - $2 million
Another $2 million sale from 2017 was closed by @Ali Zandi of Starfire Holdings and was revealed on an episode of @DomainSherpa, in which Ali shares as many details on the sale as possible.
The name was acquired for $2 million by Freedom Mortgage Corporation, who are redirecting Freedom.com to their established FreedomMortgage.com domain name.
01.com - $1.82 million
Two-number .COM domains have been an attractive prospect for Chinese investors in particular, with Chinese registrants accounting for at least 27% of two-number .COM domains, according to the Q2 2018 report by GGRG.
The second-largest publicly disclosed two-number .COM sale of all time was closed in 2017 by VIP Brokerage. The name, 01.com, sold for $1.82 million to a Chinese buyer. It is currently not resolving.
20.com - $1.75 million
The second two-number .COM domain on our list was owned by serial entrepreneur @Jason Calacanis, who bought the name in 2006 for $75,000. Although Jason revealed that he previously received offers in the $2million to $3 million range, he cashed in at $1.75 million with the help of broker @Joe Uddeme.
The name currently hosts a Chinese domain marketplace, with a number of liquid names available through the platform.
MyWorld.com - $1.2 million
Seeing a two-word .COM domain sell for seven-figures is a rare event, but broker Larry Fischer (@changejobs) managed to achieve this feat on behalf of the seller, Anything.com.
The name, which sold for $1.2 million, was acquired by myWorld Solutions, an Austrian company with a wide range of product marketing and management services. MyWorld.com currently hosts the company’s corporate homepage.
VPN.com - $976,730
The sales price of VPN.com was only confirmed in July 2018 after a press release from the domain’s owner. The new owner, Michael Gargiulo, also took part in an interesting @DomainSherpa interview that describes how he negotiated the acquisition and subsequently developed the name.
Michael reportedly spent over $2 million on developing the name, and VPN.com now displays a site dedicated to virtual private networks (VPN).
Purple.com - $900,000
Purple.com is one of a handful of domains to have its own Wikipedia page, describing the domain as hosting a single-page website created in 1994. According to Wikipedia, it was notable as being the oldest known single-serving site.
However, in November 2017, former owner Jeff Abrahamson confirmed that he sold the name. The price wasn’t disclosed until March 2018 when George Kirikos (@GeorgeK) discovered the sale in an SEC filing from Purple Innovations LLC.
The domain now hosts the homepage of Purple, a mattress company that was founded in 2015 and merged with Global Partner Acquisition Corp. in July 2017 in a deal that valued the company at $1.1 billion.
SW.com - $660,000
The only two-letter .COM name on our list is SW.com. This name was part of the RightOfTheDot.com NamesCon 2017 auction but failed to sell at the event. With help from broker Sharjil Saleem, RightOfTheDot closed the sale some weeks later for $660,000.
Despite some obvious potential end users such as South Western Airlines, the name was sold to a Chinese investor. As of writing, the domain fails to resolve.
Lola.com - $550,000
Our tenth and final name of the list is Lola.com, which sold for $550,000 in a bankruptcy auction for BCBG Max Azria. Launched by BCBG Max Azria in 2011, Lola was the company’s secondary fashion label, but by 2017 the company was looking to offload the name.
The domain was acquired by Lola Travel Company, Inc. of Boston, MA, a business travel service founded in 2015. Months before acquiring the name, Lola secured a $25 million Series B funding round. The domain currently hosts the company’s main website.
Place.com - $550,000
There is technically an eleventh entry on our list since Lola.com and Place.com were tied on $550,000. Unfortunately, there's very little to tell about Place.com. It sold in May 2017 in a deal co-brokered by RightOfTheDot.com and GoDaddy. As of writing, the name displays a simple landing page with no indication of who owns the name. The WHOIS listing gives no clues either.
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