We typically do not participate in discussions unless specifically tagged but using words like "Scam" is going a little too far, so I am offering a response here.
First of all, we offer three ways to participate in our Marketplace:
- Submit names that you already own
- Submit names that are still unregistered, you will register if they are approved
- Submit names that are still unregistered, SH will register if they are approved
If you are an active domain investor, it certainly makes sense to register the names yourself - not only do you pay a significantly lower commission compared to SH registered option, you also retain full flexibility to remove your domains from marketplace and sell them elsewhere if you prefer. The SH registered option is for those people who do not wish to take an investment risk for upfront reg fees and/ or for ongoing renewals.
Within the SH registered option, there are two ways we handle renewals.
You can continue to have SH pay for any renewals or pay $10 (or $5 + 500 points) to keep your original commissions.
Most people choose to have SH continue to pay for their renewals - so they have zero investment risk for the entire lifespan of the marketplace listing but in that case the commission reduces slightly every year. For example, if your domain is initially approved to receive 25% in the first year, you may receive 22% of the selling price in the next year, 20% in the following year, and so on. We have not had a situation where the commission of a seller has dropped below 18% and we do not intend to do go below that number. It is, however, possible (and likely) that after few years we may stop offering renewal options on that domain because we can not pay for renewals in perpetuity - in that scenario the domain will be dropped.
Many creatives on SH platform are not domain investors. Several of them do not wish to take investment risk for their domains, and they choose the SH registered option to protect their names so that they can continue to submit their names to contests, and build a portfolio in the Marketplace at the same time.
At the end of the day, there are several ways to participate in the marketplace so that sellers/creatives can decide for themselves what method works the best in their situation. The rules for each method are clearly stated in our Marketplace Terms.