analysis Major NET Sales: Price, Type, Length, Venue and Current Use

While .com certainly dominates the domain name aftermarket, significant .net sales continue to take place. For this article, I took a look at NameBio recorded .net sales of $10,000 or more during the period Jan 1, 2015 to Aug 10, 2020. There were 206 .net sales of $10,000 or more during this period, although only 3 were at $100,000 or more. Most of the sales were short names, with many single words. I found that more than half of the names were currently unused for websites, or were listed for sale again. See what else I found below.

Results Summary

• There were 206 .net sales above $10,000, but only 23 sales were valued at $50,000 or more.
• Among all .net sales above $10,000, 39.5% were single word, 16.6% two word and 28.3% were short (3 letter or less, but not a word). 9.3% were numeric and another 2.4% alphanumeric.
• Most were English, although a number of other languages were also represented.
• Most of the major .net sales were short, 65.6% just 6 characters or less. Names of length 15 characters or more represented less than 3% of the set.
• The number of high value .net sales per year recently is less than in 2015, but is fairly constant over the last few years.
• Only 34.5% of the names were currently in use for developed websites, although an additional 8.3% were used for redirection. 20.9% were listed for sale again, while 34.5% were unused, going to no operational lander or site.
• I had a look at where the sales happened, with 73 at Sedo, 49 at Uniregistry and 35 at NameJet.
• While this study was 2015-2020, I also looked at the highest .net sales of all time. On that list of higher-value sales, only one.net sale of $150,000 or more was from 2017-2020.

Data

Here are the results of the analysis expressed in graphical form. The data is plotted in terms of number of sales.

Most of the 206 sales (64%) are in the $10,000 to $19,999 range.



While single word domains are most popular at 39.5% of the sales, there are also a large number of short (3 letter or less) sales, and a smaller number of multiple word, numeric, and alphanumeric names



While most single words were in English, there were a number of other languages represented such as juegos (games in Spanish), pferde (horse in German), apuestas (bets in Spanish), dami (quantity in Filipino), fiable (reliable in French), storia (history in Italian), bilet (ticket in Turkish and some other languages) and fora (net in Portugese).

A number of place names sold, including Portugal, Mallorca and Madrid. Both plural and singular names are in the list, and there were two hyphenated names.

The high value .net sales from 2015 to the present were definitely concentrated in short names. Fully 21.4% of the sample were just 2 characters in length, while names of length 3 added another 18%. Only 6 of the sales were 15 characters or more.



I had a look at how many of the $10,000 plus .net sales were from each calendar year. There is some indication of a modest decrease as time goes on, although the last few years have been fairly constant. Note that for 2020 I extrapolated to a predicted number for the entire year assuming the rate of sales stays the same.



For each of the 206 names, I investigated current use. A total of about 43% were either developed or used for redirection to a developed site. However, more than half were either not used at all or for sale again. Particularly among the very short names, many seem to be simply being held for future sale or use. This pattern of many names that have sold for large amounts not in active use is not unique to .net, however.



The sales venues are dominated by just a few places, although keep in mind that not all marketplaces report sales to NameBio.




Highest Value Sales 2015-2020

Here are .net sales in the NameBio database at prices of $50,000 or more for the period Jan 1, 2015 to Aug 10, 2020.

• recovery.net $200,000
• 95.net $140,000
• co.net $100,000
• 08.net $87,000
• career.net $85,000
• arc.net $80,000
• odds.net $70,000
• FM.net $70,000
• app.net $70,000
• oge.net $62,000
• juegos.net $60,000
• 16.net $60,000
• HorseRacing.net $60,000
• BJ.net $60,000
• RZ.net $58,100
• DJ.net $55,500
• coffee.net $55,000
• FZ.net $55,000
• JR.net $55,000
• sudoku.net $52,863
• PF.net $51,720
• RS.net $50,600
• esports.net $50,000

All Time Highest Value NET Sales

I also briefly looked at the highest value .net sales of all time, at least of those recorded in the NameBio database.

• mobile.net $500,000 (2014)
• sex.net $454,500 (2006)
• porn.net $400,000 (2006)
• RealEstate.net $300,000 (2007)
• lottery.net $220,000 (2010)
• recovery.net $200,000 (2016)
• DIY.net $200,000 (2007)
• pisos.net $187,500 (2008)
• CDN.net $185,000 (2012)
• Chinese.net $180,000 (2019)
• yes.net $175,000 (2014)
• RingTones.net $175,000 (2007)
• cars.net $170,000 (2011)
• 99.net $150,000 (2014)
• pizza.net $150,000 (2013)
• news.net $150,000 (2005)

Note that only one of the sales at $150,000 or more was 2017 or later.

Over all time and sales values, a total of $72.3 million in .net sales volume recorded in NameBio, spread over 44,100 sales, with an average price of $1639. The average price for .net during the last five years is lower, at $905, but still accounts for $19.1 million in sales volume.


Your Input

Feel free to contribute in the comments section.

1. How do you see the outlook for .net going forward?
2. What types of names do you think hold greatest current value in the extension?
3. Which of the listed major sales do you think is the most valuable name, even if it did not fetch the highest price?
4. Don’t be modest about sharing major .net sales you have made.
5. Do you hold many .net names in your portfolio? Is that increasing or decreasing?
6. What is your take on why so many names that sold for large amounts are not currently in active use?

Thanks to NameBio for the data that made this study possible. Domainers, remember that you can report your sales directly to NameBio with their online form.