Hi Ategy. I notice that you are Canadian. In the U.S., "K" means thousand. The $35K I mention is the same as the XX,XXX you mention.
Anyway, Zandi sold aus.com as follows:
aus.com bought April 21, 2015 sold May 29, 2015, gross profit $24,098.
aus.com was resold for $345K on 8/14/16, and is now a company website - my point being that his instinct undervalued it. General point being that that time period 2015 was an on-fire period for domain sales, and that this quote applies to that time period, moreso than that any one person was an expert or exceptionally sharp:
A lot of people made quick easy money during the War and for several years after. Any business was good, just as any stock is good on a rising market. People thought they were sharp operators, when actually they were just riding a lucky streak. Now the Valley is in a losing streak and only the big operators can ride it out.
As far as Perception, all indications are that it folded. I don't believe that time period, second half of 2015, had anything to do with Zandi's health problems, which are more recent. The indication that it folded was the rapidity with which it went away. From waybackmachine, the website disappeared within six months with a notice that is was remodelling, and then disappeared entirely, never came back from "remodelling" - went dark. Viable businesses don't disappear that quickly, nor do they post remodelling notices and then never come back at all.
As far a Starfire, which two have mentioned, this is not an investment fund as Perception was. Starfire is a domain name and brokerage firm. I mean, my company
www.xynames.com is a domain name and brokerage firm, I have a lot of cash, but I am not an investment fund.
Investment funds for domains were a thing of that on-fire period, 2015, where any domain was good on a rising market. You're not going to see that sort of thing these days, but perhaps again in the future.
Another example of an investment fund that went nowhere is
https://www.namepros.com/blog/exclu...in-investment-fund.912489/page-7#post-6388979
but at least Perception did exist for some months while this $20M fund was all talk never came into being at all. Interestingly, this $20M fund was announced in January 2016, right at the time that Perception folded.