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advice Offered [cityname].com to .gov but how much to ask?

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maya-zir

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Hi, domainers, I need help.
I offered [cityname].com to .gov and they asked the price. I have no idea what to say.

Thier actual domain is 7-letters-name+fl.gov
My domain is 7-letters-Name+city.com

This is a city with 140k population in fl state.
Avg income 25k, median income 65k.

I need advise.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Sad to see no one helping here. Would be a great educational thread.
 
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I wish I could help but I am not experienced in selling domain names to city governments. This requires someone with experience. Sorry.
 
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No problem, thanks for try
 
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I would offer mid or high 5 figures.
 
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I meant I would offer them a price if they asked. I thought mid or high 5 figures would be fair even though I have no idea on the city. 140k population is not small especially if it's a city with lots of tourism hotels. However after checking the name I see other TLD's are available to register. If you ask for 5 figures buyer may register other TLDs. Also it's not the exact name. The exact city is registered in many TLD's. I would ask for mid or low 4 figures.
 
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The city is named "Miramar", not "Miramar City". It is only taken in a handful of domains.
I would basically take whatever I could get for it.

Best of luck.

Brad
 
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Municipalities are usually budget strapped, it could be just curiousity, as they would have to jump thru many hoops to authorize 5 figures to be honest. They probably have a 3 figure budget without getting others to sign off.
 
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Municipalities are usually budget strapped, it could be just curiousity, as they would have to jump thru many hoops to authorize 5 figures to be honest. They probably have a 3 figure budget without getting others to sign off.

Yes, it is likely to be extremely complex to get a city to authorize the purchase of a domain, especially when you initiated contact. There are often many decision makers in that type of scenario.

Brad
 
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I would put it on auction using their first offer. Most probably they are more familiar to buy things from public auctions.
 
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I sent a short inquiry via FB and they answered:

Good afternoon. Thank you for your inquiry. We are currently looking for a domain. What is the cost?

I sent link to Flippa and told BIN was 5k.
They still didnt read my answer
 
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Anyway, if they would offer less then I expect, I just make there directory website and will sell ads, space and local business promo.
I have a few more city domains for develop.
 
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Here's a search of Geo+Keyword.com with "city" at the end:

https://namebio.com/?s==czN3IDM3AjM

Seems like it would be worth very low four figures retail in the best case scenario, maybe $1,000 to $2,500. Very low sales velocity, and some of those 29 matches are not even valid because city really was part of the city name and the "+keyword" component was something else (like HotelAtlanticCity), or part of a common phrase like DetroitMotorCity or NashvilleMusicCity.

As others have mentioned, getting the government to buy something is very difficult. Your best bet would have been contacting them towards the end of the year when departments are blowing their budgets making sure they spend everything so they don't get their budgets reduced the next year.

Good luck!
 
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Here's a search of Geo+Keyword.com with "city" at the end:

https://namebio.com/?s==czN3IDM3AjM

Seems like it would be worth very low four figures retail in the best case scenario, maybe $1,000 to $2,500. Very low sales velocity, and some of those 29 matches are not even valid because city really was part of the city name and the "+keyword" component was something else (like HotelAtlanticCity), or part of a common phrase like DetroitMotorCity or NashvilleMusicCity.

As others have mentioned, getting the government to buy something is very difficult. Your best bet would have been contacting them towards the end of the year when departments are blowing their budgets making sure they spend everything so they don't get their budgets reduced the next year.

Good luck!
I better then make directory site then accept low price
 
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I better then make directory site then accept low price
As someone who works for a company (State Ventures) who builds Geo guides on exact match city or state .com domains, I wouldn't really recommend this. Even if you owned Miramar.com it would be a borderline development project unless you actually live there, as directory sales are very difficult without a local presence. MiramarCity.com has no distinct advantage over other domains as far as SEO because it isn't known as "Miramar City" and probably gets no type-in traffic.

If you can get a grand or two out of them I would take it, and then if you're really set on the idea of building a Miramar directory take that money and go hand register DiscoverMiramar.com (available) or something similar and build on that. There are tons of prefixes and suffixes you can add to a city name to build a site on like: visit, travel, guide, go, etc. At least then if it is a project you never get around to (most likely) or it doesn't get traction, you have a few grand in your pocket and a domain of similar quality instead of nothing.
 
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Municipalities are usually budget strapped, it could be just curiousity, as they would have to jump thru many hoops to authorize 5 figures to be honest.
Or they are building a case to send a C&D later...

I don't know who is the decision maker but I would look at the whois for the .gov domain. .gov domains are paid too ($125/year I think).
Personally I would not even bother trying to sell a name to a public entity outbound.
 
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It is not clear whether you are offering Miramar(.)com or MiramarCity(.)com without the parentheses. The latter imo has little value and I would take low $xxx to eliminate renewals. The former domain without the city is a very nice name. I lived in Pembroke Pines which is adjacent to Miramar for about fifteen years and worked out at Ansin Sports Complex in Miramar numerous times. The city has grown rapidly the last twenty years and has attracted a number of businesses to the area. If you look at what cities spend on construction projects you know they have resources. But do they need this domain? What does it do for them? Most people outside this industry do not see a reason to pay more than $100 for a domain. So that is always a challenge no matter how good or relevant a domain is to a particular rend user.
 
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When I started investing in 2015 and read heavily about domain investing I came across some info that a cityname.com could be valuated 1 cent per inhabitant. In your case this would be $1,400.
Good luck with your sale.
 
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Not necessarily. But people may react angrily to what they perceive rightly or wrongly as blackmail/squatting, or with a sense of entitlement. Doesn't mean they are right. And just because they asked for a price doesn't mean they have an intention to buy.
 
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I’m surprised that they even responded but no sale will result from it if you place it in auction as the city wouldn’t even be able to mobilize in time to approve any potential bids so I would definitely nix that idea.

The answer to this question is who buys exactcityname dot com domains and how much do they typically pay? Some of the local examples I’ve found are owned by the respective chambers of commerce (others seem to be straight commercial sites offering tourist related offers and promotions) but, as noted above, are the exact city name not city name + “city” so I’m not sure of the value of your domain unless the exact city domain dot com is already taken by a city in another state and this municipality really wants a dot com. You should do more research on this before asking questions including looking up any past comparable city dot com sales if any such records exist. NamePros should be a place to ask questions building on data you’ve already found versus just a blind “What ya’ think?” hoping that everyone else will do all the work for you.

Example of chamber of commerce owned:
Poway.com

Example of (apparently) straight commercial site:
SanDiego.com

Just F.Y.I. the domain lasvegascity.com appears to be a redirect to the mostly Expedia owned site trivago.com so someone thought that a MAJOR city name plus “city” dot com was worth something.

The straight commercial use of the above city’s names in dot com sites belies any notion that doing so would result in any legal action by a US city anyway to seize the domain.
 
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I have access to internet just from phone these days so I cant make any investigations :(
Thats why I asked here.
 
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Looks like you have it priced at the right range, so I'd just wait and see what happens. If they offer you a little less it will be $xxx range.
 
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