Contacted by previous owner

[DomainDepot]

I recently bought an expired domain. I was contacted by the previous with the following message (see below). Would be curious to hear other people's thoughts on how to proceed. I have no bad faith/intent with the name, but I am also not in the domain game as a charity. Thank you for your thoughts!

DomainDepot


Email I received:

I am the previous owner of the domain (domain removed) and it had been my business domain for quite some time.

I was unable to renew the domain due to fraud on my bank account which caused me to lose money and have to change my bank and credit cards. This matter was cleared up this week and I am finally able to conduct business again.

I was made aware that you were able to purchase the domain yesterday and I would like to know if you would be willing to sell it back to me. I would be willing to reimburse you the registration fees and also pay you the amount that I would've paid to reconnect the domain.

Thank you in advance for your time,
Name Removed

 

[BML]

I would help previous owner because some day it could happen to me too. But small finder fee would be nice. Of course first he would have to prove that he was previous owner. But that is what I would do

 

[baseballworld]

Helping them could go a long way in the future.

 

[Haykay2005]

He should prove that to you before you proceed

 

[momentum]

First you need to confirm that this is actually the previous owner. Not just someone trying to get a deal on a dropped domain they missed.

Then it is up to you about how charitable you want to be. I am normally a nice guy and let them have the name back for cost plus $100. Unless it is a really great domain name then you have other considerations.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

It depends on the domain name...
If it is strong - charity is not my choice definitely... and not my problems if somebody can't renew it within 45 or restore within the following 30 days...

 

[johname]

The question is, why did you buy the domain in the first place? and what are the odds of there really being bare any endusers for the domain? And is your lowest price in the ball park to what they have in mind? (feels low xxx)

A do it Example would be: A) bought the domain for fast flip B) Less than five endusers to contact and all them are very iffy. C) I was only going to ask for $xxx anyways.

A Dont do it Example would be: A) bought the domain because I have plans for it, or higher investment B) There a lot of people that would be interested in owning this. C) The min I would sell this for is pretty high.

There also the nice guy thing Good Luck

 

[mad409]

Something about this excuse doesn't fly, the domain owner had ample time to renew the domain and his email wasn't affected or at least they didn't mention it. Banks cover fraud therefore why the need to change banks? I personally would need more details before handing over a domain.

The only reason a bank might not help in this type situation is if the account holder was grossly negligent.

Honestly i don't get the reasoning behind the email you received other than I want my domain back.

 

[Emmy101]

I would help previous owner because some day it could happen to me too. But small finder fee would be nice. Of course first he would have to prove that he was previous owner. But that is what I would do

 

[infosec3]

I like his attitude. If he was in deed the owner, I would accept his offer.

 

[Bannen]

In what way have you authenticated that this was indeed the previous owner? Did you look at the archived snapshots of the website via Wayback Machine, to see the contact page info and match it up with this person's email addy? Did you look at a Whois history (like via DomainTools paid tool for whois history) to see if this person's name and email were ever associated with this domain? First, you need to establish that this person is telling the truth.

If they're legit, then I second @johname comments regarding price etc. But also I'm not quite buying their reason for losing the domain; there's a roughly 3 month period around an expiring domain... at least a few weeks before expiry you get warning emails, then after expiry there's another couple months to renew/redeem the domain; this person, in all that time, couldn't have a friend or family member pay for the domain? Couldn't use one of the many payment methods other than credit card? Couldn't - and this one is absolutely simple, anyone can do it - have a trusted family member, friend, or business associate open up their own account at the same registrar, push the domain to them before it expires, have them pay the $10 renewal fee, and push it back to his account?

And then all that bank fraud mess 'just happened to be cleaned up this week' and he was able to email you and pay you the very day after you got the domain? After months of his issues, it clears up the exact moment you get the domain?

Could be legit and maybe this old owner was just too slow in the brain to work out these simple options; but the options are so simple, that his excuse of 'bank fraud' etc to me smells really fishy, and his timing of things 'getting cleared up' the exact day you get the domain is extremely fishy.

There are legit cases of people losing their domains through unfortunate circumstances, and then contacting the new owners later, and each of us has to go with our own gut/heart/financial considerations about giving them the domain for a cheap price. But in your case, I'm just seeing warning signals and it looks fishy.

Have fun

 

[DomainDepot]

Thank you everyone for the responses. Some insightful thoughts and ideas.

Update:
Did some DD. Whois history shows that this is the previous owner and found a snapshot of the what the site looked like. I tend to agree with people here that the previous owner's explanation seems a little precarious. You have several months of warnings and email reminders to renew the name. Plus the owner claims to have had the name a while which gives ample time to extend the ownership. This is a name I would normally quote in the low to mid $X,XXX. I decided to offer the domain for sale at a low/mid $XXX as a compromise. I also offered to point the name at any DNS/url they want for 90 days before listing it for sale.

 

[maxtorz]

I have been in this situation before a couple times, and really you need to refer to your SOP or business plan and execute/take appropriate action, otherwise you are just a rookie and you are taking emotional based decisions and that's wrong:

1. You are an investor! Your domains are LIABILITIES, they cost money and you are in business to make money. If you bought someone's foreclosed house at auction for 5K and the previous owner approaches you and asks to pay 5K + nominal fees would you sell it back to him? NOT A CHANCE! Nobody would. Same goes with domain names or any other investments.
2.If the domain name is a solid 2word name and you think it's worth 2-5K then you need to ask for what the domain is worth; sure offer a discount if he was the previous owner as in (20%-30% discount)
3.the previous owner had more then ENOUGH time to renew his domain name, think about how many remainder emails you get from Godaddy to renew your domain.

I am not saying here to ask $20,000(inflated price) from the previous owner for a domain you bought yesterday on the clouseout auction for $11! I am saying if it's a 2-5K domain then ASK THAT. More important here is the fact that you should have a BUSINESS PLAN and refer to it when this kind of stuff happens.

Cheers everyone!

 

[Mister Funsky]

This is a name I would normally quote in the low to mid $X,XXX. I decided to offer the domain for sale at a low/mid $XXX as a compromise. I also offered to point the name at any DNS/url they want for 90 days before listing it for sale.

Very reasonable on your part...if he/she doesn't buy at the lowered price or graciously accept your offer to redirect, then that person doesn't value the name. Then you can list at full retail.

 

[Smiles76]

I have been in this situation before a couple times, and really you need to refer to your SOP or business plan and execute/take appropriate action, otherwise you are just a rookie and you are taking emotional based decisions and that's wrong:

1. You are an investor! Your domains are LIABILITIES, they cost money and you are in business to make money. If you bought someone's foreclosed house at auction for 5K and the previous owner approaches you and asks to pay 5K + nominal fees would you sell it back to him? NOT A CHANCE! Nobody would. Same goes with domain names or any other investments.
2.If the domain name is a solid 2word name and you think it's worth 2-5K then you need to ask for what the domain is worth; sure offer a discount if he was the previous owner as in (20%-30% discount)
3.the previous owner had more then ENOUGH time to renew his domain name, think about how many remainder emails you get from Godaddy to renew your domain.

I am not saying here to ask $20,000(inflated price) from the previous owner for a domain you bought yesterday on the clouseout auction for $11! I am saying if it's a 2-5K domain then ASK THAT. More important here is the fact that you should have a BUSINESS PLAN and refer to it when this kind of stuff happens.

Cheers everyone!

This is why people hate domainers. I'm fine with the OP keeping the name but there is NOTHING you can say to justify asking 2-5K for a domain you just bought for $11. That's like a person buying a house one day for $100,000 and asking $1 million the next day without adding any value to the home. It would NEVER happen.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

So if I caught LLL.in for $11 - I should sell it for $xx or what???

Idiotism...

 

[Buffu93]

Why waste your time with investigating? Simply give him an offer and discount, and that's it.

 

[Furquan]

He left the domain to be expired! Now it's with you, just send him your offer after all we are domainer & we can't just let go an opportunity because someone forget to renew there business domain name. If the domain was with me I have asked high $.


I don't knew why I am unable to manage a $20 for my business domain name renewal.

 

[maxtorz]

This is why people hate domainers. I'm fine with the OP keeping the name but there is NOTHING you can say to justify asking 2-5K for a domain you just bought for $11. That's like a person buying a house one day for $100,000 and asking $1 million the next day without adding any value to the home. It would NEVER happen.

We are investors, and our job is NOT to get people to like us, but to BUY from us. Haters, negative people are a dime a dozen. "LIKES" don't pay my bills nor my $10,000+/year in domain renewals!!!!
If you can't justify and come up with WHY you are asking 2-5k for a domain name that's a different problem and you have failed business/sales basics.
In the last 10 years I haven't had any client say "hey man you domainers suck and I regret paying $$$ for that domain after they bought from me". Common man get real and stop whining!

 

[Haris]

This is why people hate domainers. I'm fine with the OP keeping the name but there is NOTHING you can say to justify asking 2-5K for a domain you just bought for $11. That's like a person buying a house one day for $100,000 and asking $1 million the next day without adding any value to the home. It would NEVER happen.

It would NEVER happen? We do that all the time.

 

[Kate]

Apparently many registrants are quite naive, thinking they can just let a domain expire and buy it back, like nobody will notice. They don't realize droplists are published for the whole world to see and hundreds of vultures (that is us) are waiting to snag those names. Even crap names can be desirable for the residual traffic.
If only people would realize what's going on and the shenanigans in this industry.

 

[Nick]

The tone of this guy is quite the opposite of what I had to deal with this week. Had the email to me sounded more like this one, I'd most likely have helped the guy out after verifying his story. By "helped", I don't mean give for free, but certainly taken his story into consideration when giving a price, like you seem to have done.

 

[MR Harrist]

if the domain non keywords, or hard to sell, just ask him $299, and I am sure its fair enough! but if the domain name have keywords and have huge potential fo $xx,xxx! if I were you I will give link to godaddy landing page and ask him to do BIN! because I am sure that person is domainer or maybe broker!

since you don;t mention the domain, name! maybe $299.

 

[DomainDepot]

Thanks for all the great responses:

Update:
Previous owner has agree to 90 day timeframe for $500 price. I told him I would point the name to his page in the interim while he scrambles to figure things out. I think it is a reasonable compromise. Like some of the members here have stated, his tone has made me sympathize a bit. What if something similar happened to me? If he had acted like a jerk then I would probably have responded differently. I can afford to be reasonable in this case and I feel it is warranted.

 

[parkdo]

good way to buy a domain from other owner