My First Year in Domaining – Small Wins, Frustrations, and Lessons

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Hi folks,

I thought I’d share a bit of my experience as a beginner in domaining. I started in August 2024, and honestly, it’s been a rollercoaster.


When I first jumped in, I had no idea what I was doing (still don’t, to be honest ). I started with around 10 domains, just testing the waters and hoping at least one of them wasn’t a complete disaster. After about 3 months, I had my first real breakthrough: I sold CrashChat.com for $2,988. That was a huge moment for me; it gave me the confidence that domaining works if you stay patient. Later on, in March 2025, I made another sale for $375. Not life-changing, but it felt good to see progress. Along the way, I’ve also had a few tiny auction flips here and there, nothing major, but they kept me moving.

Looking at the numbers, I’ve invested a little over $1,000 (around 100 domains now, most of them garbage if I’m being honest). From that, I’ve sold 2 domains plus a few small auction names, so the ROI is decent. But I’ll be real, it’s also frustrating. I expected more liquidity, and sometimes it feels like you’re just stuck waiting for months with no movement.

Still, the sell-through rate on my portfolio has been encouraging (Roughly 2%), and I’m learning to focus on quality instead of quantity. One big lesson I’ve realized: it’s often better to start low, get some quick wins, and recycle funds rather than sitting forever on names you’re not even sure about.


I know many of you have been through this “beginner phase,” so I just wanted to share my journey. Hopefully, a year from now, I’ll look back and see more progress.


Best,

 

[Planet9]

Yes, you’re mostly correct, but there are some nuances. The buyer could be an end user or a domain investor. For example, CrashChat was relisted on Afternic, and platforms like Atom handle premium domains differently—they do promotions.


Some end users might type a keyword and get suggestions of the most relevant names, or see domains promoted on social media. So while many sales happen because someone specifically wanted that exact domain, there are cases where discovery happens through suggestions, exposure, or promotions.


I should also mention I’m still learning this myself, so this is just my understanding as a beginner.

Honestly and I do commend people who've made money doing this, it's just very difficult to play the game if one doesn't know the rules especilly because the rules aren't very clear.My mistakes are probably because if I see a domain that has sold for significant money, I assume a similar type domain if available to register will also sell. That has not been the case for me though there is a chance I let domains expire too soon. I also made the mistake the first few years of not trying to get register short domain names. I just wasn't aware at that time that short sold. Same with registering non .coms & using hyphens. Its just trial and error on a short budget that's more a game to me than anything else.

 

[sellian]

No it is an example of typos and not proofreading. Is that the best you got, dude?

No, you won.

 

[tolu_manny]

Hi folks,

I thought I’d share a bit of my experience as a beginner in domaining. I started in August 2024, and honestly, it’s been a rollercoaster.


When I first jumped in, I had no idea what I was doing (still don’t, to be honest ). I started with around 10 domains, just testing the waters and hoping at least one of them wasn’t a complete disaster. After about 3 months, I had my first real breakthrough: I sold CrashChat.com for $2,988. That was a huge moment for me; it gave me the confidence that domaining works if you stay patient. Later on, in March 2025, I made another sale for $375. Not life-changing, but it felt good to see progress. Along the way, I’ve also had a few tiny auction flips here and there, nothing major, but they kept me moving.

Looking at the numbers, I’ve invested a little over $1,000 (around 100 domains now, most of them garbage if I’m being honest). From that, I’ve sold 2 domains plus a few small auction names, so the ROI is decent. But I’ll be real, it’s also frustrating. I expected more liquidity, and sometimes it feels like you’re just stuck waiting for months with no movement.

Still, the sell-through rate on my portfolio has been encouraging (Roughly 2%), and I’m learning to focus on quality instead of quantity. One big lesson I’ve realized: it’s often better to start low, get some quick wins, and recycle funds rather than sitting forever on names you’re not even sure about.


I know many of you have been through this “beginner phase,” so I just wanted to share my journey. Hopefully, a year from now, I’ll look back and see more progress.


Best,

If you don't mind me asking, how did you sell your domains? I've bought 5 domains so far, all of which expired, and I'm only just trying to get back in the game

 

[Planet9]

If you don't mind me asking, how did you sell your domains? I've bought 5 domains so far, all of which expired, and I'm only just trying to get back in the game

You're kind of where I was though I bought more domains originally for $1-4 when Godaddy offered great discounts and now I pay $12.15 a pop and $129 for.ai domains. I'm wondering how these people sell domains myself. I've sold a lousy 4 in my life all for $400 each. One was sold via Ebay and the rest as far as I can figure out were bought just because someone wanted to register their name on Hodaddy, found out I owned it & paid $400 to Godaddy for it. I sold no Domains via GoDaddy Auctions when they were auctioning active domains including many I paid $19.95 to feature. I still have come to the bizarre conclusion that to sell a domain a person has to be looking to register the same specific name that you happen to own. All of which doesn't explain sales like 48753.com. etc No one is going to be looking for exact numbers like that. Hope someone can provide you some answers I can apply.

 

[URL Stream]

Honestly and I do commend people who've made money doing this, it's just very difficult to play the game if one doesn't know the rules especilly because the rules aren't very clear.My mistakes are probably because if I see a domain that has sold for significant money, I assume a similar type domain if available to register will also sell. That has not been the case for me though there is a chance I let domains expire too soon. I also made the mistake the first few years of not trying to get register short domain names. I just wasn't aware at that time that short sold. Same with registering non .coms & using hyphens. Its just trial and error on a short budget that's more a game to me than anything else.

If permitted, it may be worth pointing out what seems to be a deeper, more fundamental mistake.

"What the human being is best at doing is interpreting all new information so that their prior conclusions remain intact.”
– Warren Buffett

“We see what we want to see, and we hear what we want to hear.”
– John Powell

“Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true.”
– Francis Bacon

Thanks for all your contributions to the forum — and best of luck!

 

[tolu_manny]

You're kind of where I was though I bought more domains originally for $1-4 when Godaddy offered great discounts and now I pay $12.15 a pop and $129 for.ai domains. I'm wondering how these people sell domains myself. I've sold a lousy 4 in my life all for $400 each. One was sold via Ebay and the rest as far as I can figure out were bought just because someone wanted to register their name on Hodaddy, found out I owned it & paid $400 to Godaddy for it. I sold no Domains via GoDaddy Auctions when they were auctioning active domains including many I paid $19.95 to feature. I still have come to the bizarre conclusion that to sell a domain a person has to be looking to register the same specific name that you happen to own. All of which doesn't explain sales like 48753.com. etc No one is going to be looking for exact numbers like that. Hope someone can provide you some answers I can apply.

I don't consider you to be where I'm at. looool. I would absolutely love 1 or 2 $400 sales at the moment. I will try working to sell it on ebay, so thank you for that tip. Good luck to you going forward.

 

[Planet9]

I don't consider you to be where I'm at. looool. I would absolutely love 1 or 2 $400 sales at the moment. I will try working to sell it on ebay, so thank you for that tip. Good luck to you going forward.

I think the main thing is just to limit the mount of money you want to play with each year. Don't register anything but Coms. Thanks to newna.me you should use the appraisal tool at https://www.atom.com/domain-appraisal and before you purchase a domain see if they even appraise it at $1,000 or more and if they give it a 6, register it, a 5 or above register it if you feel good about it, use 2 or 3 good words. I'm pricing my domains at about 25% of the appraised value, you might want to make it 20% to get your first sale, I'm sure you will get a lot better advice from others on Nmepros.

Find out after Ebay gets their cut, what is the lowest price you could sell a domain for and still make $50-100 profit and price ithem like that till you make your first sale. If you look up either Elmore.ai or SonofBruno (Seller usename) you can see the format I've used for domain listings on Ebay and feel free to use it if you want. Also don't buy domains with hyphens. I'm sure people on Namepros can give you better advice than this but if it helps, great.

 

[DomainBFF]

Congrats on your success! Wish you even more sales!

I'm myself only 2.5 years into domaining. 95% of my portfolio are handregs (mostly .com).

Excluding wholesale deals, 1 private sale & 1 Atom sale, this is from my Afternic dashboard.

All time revenue:

Show attachment 281337

This year:

Show attachment 281338

It's getting better I guess Still hunting for good regs almost everyday even though the majority of them will never sell.

Portfolio size varied between 400-600 names and is now at around 500 names.

It can be done. It's not easy. But it's fun. You have to be obsessed though.

Wow that's impressive. I'm almost 15 years in and definitely wasn't hitting those numbers in the beginning. Patience pays though - stay the course!

Now if only my Atom didn't look like this

 

[tolu_manny]

Look man, I cannot appreciate you enough for the advice. I learnt the hyphen thing the hard way, and accidentally misspelt one of my domains that had a high-value keyword as well ("counselling" instead of "counseling"). All in all, I appreciate you so much for this, you have no idea. Thank you.

 

[cooljub]

accidentally misspelt one of my domains that had a high-value keyword as well ("counselling" instead of "counseling")

Not a misspelling.