I own a bunch of real estate and mortgage geos and I'm active on the largest community site for real estate agents. Yesterday one of the members, a marketing guru, made a post about the new TLD's such as .realestate and how they would change web navigation. In bold letters he stated, I Hear the Domain Squatters Coming Out of the Woodwork! along with a couple of other 'squatter' slams.
This is the response I posted:
I have my feet firmly planted in both worlds – domains and real estate. Hopefully I can add some insight without causing any flaming or offending anyone.
There are many similarities in domains and real estate. One of the key similarities is that value is based on location – the better the location, or the domain, the more valuable it is. In the United States .com is Main Street, all of the other Top Level Domains (Tld’s) like .net or .realestate will always be side streets.
Why is .com Main Street? Because American businesses have spent billions of dollars promoting .com’s. It is extremely unlikely that a similar level of promotion, over an extended period of time, will ever occur for any other Tld. American consumers have .com permanently ingrained in their brains as the #1 suffix for Internet addresses – this is extremely hard to change (see the book Positioning for more on this topic).
There are further similarities between real estate and domains. If you were approached by an investor who wanted to buy and hold raw land, would you define him as a squatter? If this investor decided to legally put up billboards on his land, is he doing something wrong? If another buyer came along and wanted to buy the land to put up a building, but the original investor rejected the offer, would you begrudge him for making that choice? If the investor paid the taxes and the upkeep on the land for 5-10 years, in the speculative hope that it goes up in value, would you advise him to sell the land for the price he originally paid?
Domain investors are no different than real estate investors. They buy, hold and resell based on the speculation that their investments will increase in value. They also recognize that Internet traffic is valuable and they sometimes put up billboards on their property to capitalize on that traffic. Some innovative domain investors are now leasing their domains to end users – just like a commercial land lease.
These facts can be frustrating when you’re trying to find a good domain name. But, there are still thousands of good real estate .com’s available in the aftermarket. You just won’t find them as new registrations from GoDaddy, and they will cost more than a new registration. Again, just like real estate.
This is the response I posted:
I have my feet firmly planted in both worlds – domains and real estate. Hopefully I can add some insight without causing any flaming or offending anyone.
There are many similarities in domains and real estate. One of the key similarities is that value is based on location – the better the location, or the domain, the more valuable it is. In the United States .com is Main Street, all of the other Top Level Domains (Tld’s) like .net or .realestate will always be side streets.
Why is .com Main Street? Because American businesses have spent billions of dollars promoting .com’s. It is extremely unlikely that a similar level of promotion, over an extended period of time, will ever occur for any other Tld. American consumers have .com permanently ingrained in their brains as the #1 suffix for Internet addresses – this is extremely hard to change (see the book Positioning for more on this topic).
There are further similarities between real estate and domains. If you were approached by an investor who wanted to buy and hold raw land, would you define him as a squatter? If this investor decided to legally put up billboards on his land, is he doing something wrong? If another buyer came along and wanted to buy the land to put up a building, but the original investor rejected the offer, would you begrudge him for making that choice? If the investor paid the taxes and the upkeep on the land for 5-10 years, in the speculative hope that it goes up in value, would you advise him to sell the land for the price he originally paid?
Domain investors are no different than real estate investors. They buy, hold and resell based on the speculation that their investments will increase in value. They also recognize that Internet traffic is valuable and they sometimes put up billboards on their property to capitalize on that traffic. Some innovative domain investors are now leasing their domains to end users – just like a commercial land lease.
These facts can be frustrating when you’re trying to find a good domain name. But, there are still thousands of good real estate .com’s available in the aftermarket. You just won’t find them as new registrations from GoDaddy, and they will cost more than a new registration. Again, just like real estate.
