LLLL.com COUNTDOWN!

[VURG]

COUNTDOWN COMPLETE!

NO MORE 4 LETTER DOMAIN AVAILABLE TO REGISTER! ​

_______________________________________________________________

Since early 2005, I have been investing/trading with 4 letter domain names. I started this thread due to the large variation in opinions on how many four letter domains there are available. When I started, I heard a range on viewpoints ranging from 200,000 down to nothing. What I learned that most people did not know how many were available.

Sources of Error for the estimates in number of available 4 letter domains include:

Traffic Testers: These are people who buy thousands of domains at a time to see if the domains are being visited and only keep the small percentage of domains that have regular visitors and cancel their orders for the domains that don't have a regular flow of visitors.

Inefficient ways of making estimates: There are over 450 thousand possible 4-Letter domains. There are short cuts that people can take in estimating the number that been registered that don't include all domains. One short cut that is often taken is for somebody to search through a list of previously available 4 letter names that they purchased (or got for free) and assume that all the names that are not on that list are registered.

People quoting old information:The variation in the number available changes all the time. Estimates that are months old are very different than up to date estimates.

People manipulating information for a sale:It definately is true that incorrect information on the available number of 4-letter domains can intensionally be manipulated to sell 4-letter domains at a higher price. Typically the lack of supply tends to motivate people to pay higher prices.

As a 4-letter domain trader, I believe that the information of how many 4-letter domains there are is extremely valuable for two main reasons. Firstly, my pricing of my names is subject to the amount of work it requires for customer to find for similar name. Secondly, if I want to increase my stock of 4-letter names than the information of how many there are at reg fee prices is essential.

I decided to update this thread when the number of available 4-letter domains dropped to the following levels:
22% Remaining - 25th January 2006
19% Remaining - 31st March 2006
16% Remaining - 29th June 2006
13% Remaining - 1st August 2006
10% Remaining - 15th February 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early April)
9% Remaining - 26th February 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early May)
8% Remaining - 2nd March 2007 (crossed without traffic testing in June)
7% Remaining - 21st March 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early July)
6% Remaining - 3rd July 2007(crossed without traffic testing some time in July)
5% Remaining - 1st August 2007(crossed without traffic testing August 11)
4% Remaining - 14th August 2007(crossed late August)
3% Remaining - 15th September 2007(crossed In September)
2% Remaining - 14th October 2007
1% Remaining - 31st October 2007
0% Remaining - 2nd November - COUNTDOWN COMPLETE!

Although, the number of available domains does sometime rise straight after it drops due to traffic testing and people dropping their domains, I don't consider it worth mentioning unless the rise is as significant as a 3% rise in the number of available domains.

Types of Four Letter Domains that have run out include:
- ALL OF THEM!

Since I started this thread important event about four letter domains that are worth mentioning happenned:

1: Late March/Early April 2006 there was a significant shift in the market for brandable (fake words) 4-letter domains and they started selling at significantly higher prices and the market for the names has been a lot more active ever since.

2: In July 2006, a namepros member 3par launched DYYO.com as a site committed to educating people about 4 letter domains. This is an excellent resource for those who are interested in 4 letter domain names.

3: In early February 2007. All the 4 letter domains starting with the letter A ran out.

4: wasistdas won QQNQ.COM, PCZV.COM & IQKE.COM for the competition for predicting when the 4 Letter domains would run out
_______________________________________________________________
Initial Post
Less than 23% of the 4 letter domain names are unregistered. I thought I'd try to keep this thread updated every time I discover another 1% reduction. I am now routinely checking the percentage of unregisted 4 letter domains.

 

[GreenGambler]

Well, Moniker has posted the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. NY results. That page includes the 111 live auction sales, plus the top 20 silent auction sales. Of those 131 domains, 15 (11.5%) are LLLL.Com. And of the total $11,625,895 in sales for those 131 domains, $1,479,240 (12.7%) are from LLLL.Com. If you only look at the .Com results, LLLL's took home 18.6% of the sales dollars. The top domain sale for this year on DNJournal is an LLLL.Com as well.

So I don't think LLLL.Com making up 10-15% of the domain market is an unreasonable or unlikely estimate.

Nice analysis Cronus. I don't think it is too far fetched an idea either and those sales stats from TRAFFIC definetly back it up.


Rep Added
Thanks,

 

[-REECE-]

Well, Moniker has posted the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. NY results. That page includes the 111 live auction sales, plus the top 20 silent auction sales. Of those 131 domains, 15 (11.5%) are LLLL.Com. And of the total $11,625,895 in sales for those 131 domains, $1,479,240 (12.7%) are from LLLL.Com. If you only look at the .Com results, LLLL's took home 18.6% of the sales dollars. The top domain sale for this year on DNJournal is an LLLL.Com as well.

So I don't think LLLL.Com making up 10-15% of the domain market is an unreasonable or unlikely estimate.

Also, this graph speaks for itself. Unless something disrupts the trend, it looks clear that the available LLLL.com are going to run out, and soon . You can say that the remaining ones are somewhat crappy, but you could say the same about the bottom 10% too (a level we reached this summer), and we've already blown through 2/3 of those.

Registering LLLL is speculative, and I wouldn't advise anyone to mortgage their home or otherwise risk their finances to buy some. But I think they are an important part of any diverse domain portfolio. And I won't be surprised if, a few years from now, people kick themselves for not buying more back in the days when they could be picked up for reg fee or better ones for <$100 at drop auctions.

Nice analysis indeed! Always enjoy reading well thought out opinions and you're getting a big rep from me (probably worth alot of points seeing as I haven't repped anyone in ~ 2 months)

I certainly do not disagree with dyyo's analysis that the LLLL.coms will run out. Month by month there are less and less... I just may pick up an extra 12 so I have an even 200

edit: Looks like my rep added a green block for you -- well deserved

 

[floatingworld]

You obviously don`t know what a trend is.

I may not sell mine but you`re going to be the best picture of the month, after all the LLLL.com Unbelievers have disapperead.......and they disapperead once we crossed the 20K mark.

Now you come at 14K saying "uh oh" 300 names dropped.... :yell:

Even if 3,000 dropped I won`t care a penny about it.

I hope NP will store this thread for at least the next 3 years.....there will be many people regretting their blind status.

The unbelievers as you describe them :ghost: :ghost: :ghost: :ghost: :ghost: will not rest...even when the min reaches $25 in the desert they will be wailing that 'only speculative domainers' are buying the nonsense combos...and so it goes....

 

[tristanperry]

So what does everyone reckon - is it best to keep your LLLL.com domains for a few years and wait until their value shoots up like LLL.com (hopefully), or sell them once their price (temporarily?) shoots up after all are taken in a couple month's time?

 

[-REECE-]

So what does everyone reckon - is it best to keep your LLLL.com domains for a few years and wait until their value shoots up like LLL.com (hopefully), or sell them once their price (temporarily?) shoots up after all are taken in a couple month's time?

Hard to say... If they went up to say $25 in a couple months time, I'd be very tempted to liquidate mine just so I could comfortably afford to renew all my names next year without perhaps compromising Xmas spending, etc.

I guess it's all about risk/reward. If you can afford to wait, you probably should. If you need the money, or the money could make a very big difference in your life, it may be best to sell or at least sell a few so that you can at a minimum, comfortably afford to renew the other ones you have next year.

 

[tristanperry]

That makes sense I think that's what I'll be doing - I have 52 LLLL.com domains, and will look to sell off maybe the 30-40% worst if their value goes up a bit, which will then pay for the renewals of the remaning 60-70%.

 

[jacal1]

Reece and Tristan...we went up another 150 or so yesterday, to 14514. I'm not saying they'll never run out (though I'm just not sure), but the question I want to pose is whether the return on the "bad" ones makes them worth registering?

When land runs out in a particular town, the value of the "good" land goes up, but that dopesn't mean the swampland ever grows in value at a pace that makes it worth holding. Its the same with commercial space in a particular area - its still no good to own it in a spot where no company is going to want to locate itself.

If we agree that the value of non-pronounceable LLLLs to end users is their acronym value, could there just not be enough companies in the world with a way to justify more than one Q or Z to support the assumption that bad LLLLs will appreciate in value?

I think you may see great value in yours if they are mostly fair or good letters (e.g. GNDF), but people banking on the "when they run out mine will automatically be worth $50 each no matter what" may be disappointed, IMHO. And if they've held them 4 or 5 years by then and sell for $40, that's a poor domaining investment.

 

[-REECE-]

Reece and Tristan...we went up another 150 or so yesterday, to 14514. I'm not saying they'll never run out (though I'm just not sure), but the question I want to pose is whether the return on the "bad" ones makes them worth registering?

When land runs out in a particular town, the value of the "good" land goes up, but that dopesn't mean the swampland ever grows in value at a pace that makes it worth holding. Its the same with commercial space in a particular area - its still no good to own it in a spot where no company is going to want to locate itself.

If we agree that the value of non-pronounceable LLLLs to end users is their acronym value, could there just not be enough companies in the world with a way to justify a Q or Z to support the assumption that bad LLLLs will appreciate in value?

I think you may see great value in yours if they are mostly fair or good letters (e.g. GNDF), but people banking on the "when they run out mine will automatically be worth $50 each no matter what" may be disappointed, IMHO. And if they've held them 4 or 5 years by then and sell for $40, that's a poor domaining investment.

I fully agree.

 

[jacal1]

Thanks Reece...some of these ideas that we all get from time to time in the hope that we can make this domaining thing easy need a reality check sometimes IMO. Thanks for bringing your thoughtfulness and expertise to moderating this thread, which is an undeniably interesting one no matter where you sit with regard to the issues.

 

[italiandragon]

Dragon, there is not 100% certainty to any of this, and an opposing opinion can be healthy. I don't think I should be called ignorant for disagreeing with you...

I will not regret anything if you make money...I will be happy for you. That said, my choice is to invest my domaining money differently, and in 3 years you and I can compare our ROI and maybe we can both learn something.

Frankly, in this business I've found that those who are making a good return already and have a sucessful business strategy are the ones who tend to tolerate "devil's advocates" and even put themselves in the shoes of those who have opposing views. See strings where Spade, Steve, NameTrader, Yofie and others are involved.

Shouldn;t you be happy that "idiots" like me will chase people away from regging these guaranteed money-makers

1) I did not call you or other people "ignorant"

2) I did not call you or other people "idiots"

3) I used the term "blind" , and forgive me but I`m still learning English, I thought it was a term related to people unable to see.

Reece and Tristan...we went up another 150 or so yesterday, to 14514. I'm not saying they'll never run out (though I'm just not sure), but the question I want to pose is whether the return on the "bad" ones makes them worth registering?

When land runs out in a particular town, the value of the "good" land goes up, but that dopesn't mean the swampland ever grows in value at a pace that makes it worth holding. Its the same with commercial space in a particular area - its still no good to own it in a spot where no company is going to want to locate itself.

If we agree that the value of non-pronounceable LLLLs to end users is their acronym value, could there just not be enough companies in the world with a way to justify more than one Q or Z to support the assumption that bad LLLLs will appreciate in value?

I think you may see great value in yours if they are mostly fair or good letters (e.g. GNDF), but people banking on the "when they run out mine will automatically be worth $50 each no matter what" may be disappointed, IMHO. And if they've held them 4 or 5 years by then and sell for $40, that's a poor domaining investment.

Today the word I can advice you to look in the dictionary is:

fluctuations


As far as for the prices, once they are all gone, it will be reasonable to expect many quick flips in the $20-$30 area but then with the increase of dropcather`s activity, It should not take long to see a minimun of $50 or $60 since Snap is asking now $60 for a crappy LLLL.com and it seems it`s going up to $100.

Who will be selling a LLLL.com for less than $50 if no LLLL.com would be available at less than $100 ?

It`s a bet. I don`t have invested all my money, it`s just a bet but the odds are very good. I put the money that I used to invest in stocks and I have a 14 years experience in stock trading.....not really a newbie about that.

And to me, even if I just sell the LLLL.com that I have , for just $10 each, it will be still a profit.......surely I`m not planning to get millionaire with this.

Well, Moniker has posted the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. NY results. That page includes the 111 live auction sales, plus the top 20 silent auction sales. Of those 131 domains, 15 (11.5%) are LLLL.Com. And of the total $11,625,895 in sales for those 131 domains, $1,479,240 (12.7%) are from LLLL.Com. If you only look at the .Com results, LLLL's took home 18.6% of the sales dollars. The top domain sale for this year on DNJournal is an LLLL.Com as well.

So I don't think LLLL.Com making up 10-15% of the domain market is an unreasonable or unlikely estimate.

Also, this graph speaks for itself. Unless something disrupts the trend, it looks clear that the available LLLL.com are going to run out, and soon . You can say that the remaining ones are somewhat crappy, but you could say the same about the bottom 10% too (a level we reached this summer), and we've already blown through 2/3 of those.

Registering LLLL is speculative, and I wouldn't advise anyone to mortgage their home or otherwise risk their finances to buy some. But I think they are an important part of any diverse domain portfolio. And I won't be surprised if, a few years from now, people kick themselves for not buying more back in the days when they could be picked up for reg fee or better ones for <$100 at drop auctions.

I could not agree more, green block from me too

You just repeated what I used to say........and let`s not forget that those are the sales we see. Then there are the one we don`t see.

 

[Alex]

ItalianDragon,

I appreciate your commitment and dedication to LLLL.com 's. I am sure a lot of people appreciated it.

I invested heavily in LLLL.com 's and today I buy another 60. For me they are very profitable as a client buys them up from me instantly for much more. And I also sold some on domain forums, so I am quite sure that they are a risk free investment.

But domaining is a profitable business in itself, and people who register names or catch them off Snap, are also wise domainers. Maybe they focus on end user sales (it is more probable that they will find an end user for a descriptive two word domain than for a random LLLL.com).

We have to respect everybody's choice. LLLL.com 's are just one choice from many a domainer has to invest his money in. While I highly feel it is a wise investment, I am sure there are other ways a domainer can fetch even more profit.

Last week, I did a frenzy search of 6 hours to find .com domains with overture of over 1.000. And I found some. And they do have type in traffic. I think they will make about $10 a year and for me this is an accomplishment too. (well considering it took me 6 hours it is not that big accomplishment, but ...)

So, I think that LLLL.com 's may be an alternative for many domianers, but I think experienced domainers have other niches too, and I fully respect them.

I would advise newbies to invest in LLLL.com 's rather in domains that make no sense. Daily I see newcomers in the appraisal sections of different forums, who put their portfolio up for appraisal (sometimes they do have 100 - 2000 names) and they are worth particulary $0 or $5. For them, I would rather suggest to invest in safe bets like the LLLL.com's, or even premium pronounceable LLLLL.com 's (I registered Cagac.com, that is a perfect pronounceable premium palindrome). and domains like this are still available.

I appreciate all those who have other niches, and make a profit from domaining even if it is a small one or big one.

As regards the buyout, I think that I would be able to complete it myself in some steps. But I think that even without me, the LLLL.com's will disappear for the first time at the beginning of November, and will not drop regularly by the end of the year.

good luck to everybody with domaining.

Alex

 

[jacal1]

Dragon, I didn't take it as personally as I made it sound...I have read other posts by you and find you to be thoughtful and helpful to others.

I am only trying to convey my opinion that the remaining LLLLs are not good investment choices IMO. The ones that are gone, including many that I'm sure you and others here already have, could provide a nice return. However, we may be at the point where only much of the unsellable swampland is left, but truly, who knows?

 

[-REECE-]

Dragon, I didn't take it as personally as I made it sound...I have read other posts by you and find you to be thoughtful and helpful to others.

I am only trying to convey my opinion that the remaining LLLLs are not good investment choices IMO. The ones that are gone, including many that I'm sure you and others here already have, could provide a nice return. However, we may be at the point where only much of the unsellable swampland is left, but truly, who knows?

From a brandability point of view, I would take Cagac.com (Alex's example) anyday over QJZW.com in example. How will endusers decide? That remains to be seen. Currently, we have bad letter LLL.coms fetching as much as good CVCV.coms, however I believe good CVCV.coms will prove to be better investments in the long run.

 

[Alex]

Dear Jacal,

Strictly on a business pov, the remaining LLLL.com's are a wise investment. I daily register tens of domains and flip them for 200% and 300% ROI to two clients of mine. They are busy domainers who believe in LLLL.com 's and do not have the time to check the available ones. they did not even hear about DYYO.com.

So, I made a fortune out of the remaining domains. I flip them almost daily (I don't want to be suspicious about selling them too much). But I am sure that these two people who have a history of 5 and 9 years in domaining, know where they invest their money in.

They sold crappy LLLL.com 's to end users for mid $xxxx. Yes crappy LLLL's as those that are available (well, almost). How? Because if an end user is interested hey do not care if they buy POHI.com (a CVCV) or YVZW.com (a crappy LLLL.com). Because it is their aconym. And they have a business in mind with these letters, and they pay as much as they think they should. They are not domainers and do not think of letter quality. They need that acronym and that's it. And I am sure these two people know what they do. I am also sure that they are lazy and stupid because they do not register the domains themselves. But that is my profit.

:hehe:

 

[italiandragon]

I agree with your last replies, guys and yes there are not many interesting combinations left.....well interesting in our languages but some non ASCII language speakers find useful the letters we don`t like so it`s happening that some of them get registered too.

Today DYYO reports : A total of 14745 domain names are found.

I`d like to add a comment to this number that everyday changes:

The total combinations are 456,976

There are 365 days in a normal year.


So, let`s imagine that the 456,976 would be registered in equal parts every day of the year. That would mean that everyday of the year there will be about 1251 LLLL.com to be renewed. Yes, more than 1 thousand LLLL.com everyday otherwise would expire.
That`s the biggest issue compared to the LLL.com, there 26x combinations.

Obviously, the scenario above did not happen, so some days there will be even 10,000 LLLL.com to be renewed and somedays could be almost none.

What would be just 1 % of the total names dropping? About 4569 LLLL.com

These are numbers that everyone here should consider.

I`m not going to post much more on this thread as I don`t want to be judged like I`m pushing people to buy crappy LLLL.com no way. I`m not regging them either.....or maybe just very few of the last ones. I`m rather buying them around.....surely I`m not selling the ones I have yet. Except very very few to finace further purchases.

I`m not sure about the prices that crappy LLLL.com will go for within 3 or 6 or 12 months. But one thing I`m sure is that they will be all registered very soon.

It does not take a genius to see the trend after following them for more than 18 months. The chart which is on DYYO is very clear.

Good luck to all.

 

[VURG]

It occured to me recently that one area of 4 letter domains that may end up being more popular than random 4 letter domains that is not getting much attention is 4 letter domains with 3 premium letters. I don't know how many there are available but I have filtered out ~65% of them to give the following two lists.

PPPL.part1
PPPL.part2

These are not lists of available names but rather lists of names to filter down further to get the available names.

There are many names like MPZH.com available which to me sound like they have more potential as acronyms than the domains with more than two of J,K,U & W but no Q,V,X,Y,Z.

 

[ssamriga]

just checked newly dropped names and regged ONMQ.com
that follows the PPPL pattern

 

[srisri24]

I just want to know, do you guys consider "zejj" as pronouncible? If so how much can be paid for it.

 

[-REECE-]

I just want to know, do you guys consider "zejj" as pronouncible? If so how much can be paid for it.

I think any name with repeating end letters will eventually be >reg fee, reseller pricing. Pronounceable or not -- it makes them easier to remember, and that's what pronounceability was all about in the first place, was it not
I think your name could fetch $1XX pretty easily.

 

[srisri24]

Thanks reece, i actually dont own zejj, but i made a purchase for xejj so iam wondering if its worth or not. Thank you again