advice Trust buyer or not trust buyer?

[BenClarke18]

Hi everyone,

I have recently purchased a domain, and have it parked and on sale at sedo. I have been contacted privately by a man, who has given me a name and cited himself as the vice president of investor relations at 123-reg. He tells me that he has a client who has a 6-figure budget for many domains, and asks for my price to buy my domain. At first I say 500GBP, but the client offers $xx,xxx (our middle man takes commission, so has cause to want a higher price).

However, here's the catch - he requires of me a screen shot of my domain management page to prove ownership, and that I buy certification from a place called 'domaintools', for 79 euros. At this point I became extremely suspicious, but he tells me it is expected that buyers are provided with certification. Is this the case? Or is he just getting me to buy one?

 

[nomen]

SCAM!

 

[BenClarke18]

I thought as much. It's not a thing to have to buy certification then?

 

[nomen]

Just another iteration of good, old appraisal scam.

 

[BenClarke18]

Fair, I'm not surprised! Anyway, I've asked him, as a token of good will, if he could send me the 79 as a sort of deposit. I won't do anything unless that is sent. Cheers

 

[KDN]

Yep it's a scam and I suggest that you search 'scam' in this forum to get information about the latest scams in the industry.

You don't need any certification whatsoever to prove that you're the owner of the domain. Using Escrow is more than enough to show good faith. Good luck, buddy!

 

[Domainace]

He tells me that he has a client who has a 6-figure budget for many domains, and asks for my price to buy my domain. At first I say 500GBP, but the client offers $xx,xxx

Those were your first 2 giant, flashing red flags.

 

[LoneDeranger]

Got that mail too. A quick research about the "guy" that sent me this discovers that this is a pure fraud.
Didn't even respond to it..

 

[BenClarke18]

Well I'm not going to lie that I'm sad, but not surprised at all! Just goes to show how true the ol' saying about things that are too good to be true is - Thanks for the advice guys!

 

[infosec3]

Great... Nice to see you asked before falling for the scam. Sometimes new domain investors are so eager to sell a domain that they would only think of the amount offered, and nothing else...

 

[matrigaldo]

I agree with @infosec3 , it's a smart move.

 

[bbmint24]

he's still sending them, got this message on my 3 f x a . c o m

Hello!

I represent an investor from the Middle East who needs NLLL.com for his new project.
My client usually buys 30-50 domains for each project to generate more traffic. He has a six figure budget so the money is not a problem for him. However, he is not going to overpay. What is your asking price?
Please contact me via email at your earliest convenience. I look forward to your reply.
If you have more domain names for sale, please email me the list. I may help you to find buyers for other names.

Regards,

R o b e r t S a u e r m a n, Ph. D.

Vice President Investor Relations

123 Domain Hosting

5 Roundwood Avenue

Stockley Park

Uxbridge

Middlesex

 

[Kate]

That scam is so old than even Jesus knows about it.

 

[towhidzaman]

Hi everyone,

I have recently purchased a domain, and have it parked and on sale at sedo. I have been contacted privately by a man, who has given me a name and cited himself as the vice president of investor relations at 123-reg. He tells me that he has a client who has a 6-figure budget for many domains, and asks for my price to buy my domain. At first I say 500GBP, but the client offers $xx,xxx (our middle man takes commission, so has cause to want a higher price).

However, here's the catch - he requires of me a screen shot of my domain management page to prove ownership, and that I buy certification from a place called 'domaintools', for 79 euros. At this point I became extremely suspicious, but he tells me it is expected that buyers are provided with certification. Is this the case? Or is he just getting me to buy one?

Easy to figure out. It's scam. There's nobody who will counter offer you $xx,xxx when you asked for $xxx especially not a vice president. if you can't figure it out then you probably shouldn't invest into domain. Learn domaining from the forum first.

 

[LucidDomains]

I got the email from this guy a couple of months back. There's a webpage dedicated to reporting his scams that I found on Google.

It could be a different guy using the same scam.

In future try Googling parts of his email if it feels a generic scam and see what Google brings up.

 

[PuSin]

Scam definitely...
Another thing to note is that this mail usually arrives on only a new email address used for registering a domain name.
Other thing is that the VICE PRESIDENT offers this generous offer on the first domain name of your list of domain names registered through that email account.
Has happened twice with me....
Same story: 123 reg and Domain tools.
Thanx to Adam Dicker show on DomainSherpa that I was aware of this.....