Hi,

I've owned this domain name for ten years. I keep getting offers on it... I was thinking of paying for an appraisal through http://www.zetetic.com/fair-market-v...appraisal.html I also saw Sedo.com does appraisals but they don't seem that good.

Has anyone used zetetic.com for appraisals or is there any site that is good for that? If not does anyone have any idea of what they think this domain may be worth? I get quite a bit of traffic through the site even though I don't have much up there.

Thanks for the help.

-M

This sounds like a Nigerian Scammer:

I tend to be very dubious of this post. Ten years ago was 1997. There simply were no short one word .com domains available then at a simple registration cost. Then your asking about appraisal. Plus the fact that this is your first post. Come on, get real. No one is this stupid.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

This sounds like a Nigerian Scammer:

I tend to be very dubious of this post. Ten years ago was 1997. There simply were no short one word .com domains available then at a simple registration cost. Then your asking about appraisal. Plus the fact that this is your first post. Come on, get real. No one is this stupid.

Wow that's pretty harsh. It's my first post because today is the first day I found this site. I got an offer for my domain which lead me to think I should get it appraised.

It's very simple to do a WHOIS on maybe.com and see exactly how long I've had it. You can also read my blog and see that yes, I'm a real person.

http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp

Record expires on 03-Mar-2012
Record created on 02-Mar-1997

There were plenty of available domain names back then for things like the word 'maybe'. I'm sure the obvious marketable names were taken pretty quickly but common words were not.

You know I was really just asking for a referral to an appraisal site. Considering how long I've had the name and how many offers I've had I was curious to know what it's worth. I'm really doubting I'll part with it though. I've had it and been using it for so long. I bought it just out of college. And there's no reason to lie about paying a normal price for a domain name considering I'm not here to try and solicit money from anyone. Sheesh.

violet02 don't worry i'm a nice guy i'll appraise your domain! I think you could land anywhere between mid $xx,xxx to high $xx,xxx for this name. If you do really own it (im not doubting you) then you have a very nice name there!

You seem to have incredible luck that just for the registration fee you were able to get a 1 word domain when I don't think anyone else in the world could get one at that price & plug in a link for another appraisal service too. Amazing.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

You seem to have incredible luck that just for the registration fee you were able to get a 1 word domain when I don't think anyone else in the world could get one at that price & plug in a link for another appraisal service too. Amazing.

WOW, talk about haters....

Phil unless you can back your comments up stop scaring people away from the forums and **** off.

Originally Posted by dave9713

violet02 don't worry i'm a nice guy i'll appraise your domain! I think you could land anywhere between mid $xx,xxx to high $xx,xxx for this name. If you do really own it (im not doubting you) then you have a very nice name there!

Thanks a lot that's good to know!

Has anyone used the appraisal service I listed above or is it best to not pay for appraisal services? If it's best not to is that because they aren't very accurate?

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

You seem to have incredible luck that just for the registration fee you were able to get a 1 word domain when I don't think anyone else in the world could get one at that price & plug in a link for another appraisal service too. Amazing.

At the time I bought (as I said before) I was just out of college, had no money and no actual clue that domain names were that hard to get. I know that people were starting to buy and park them but all I did was convert my email address at the time maybe (at) best.com (a joke, my bf picked it) to maybe.com. I said, I like the word maybe is it available? And it was. So maybe I was lucky but at the time I had no idea it would be worth anything at all. My plan wasn't to buy and sell it but to use it and I did. I had one of the only online rockabilly 'zines at the time.

I'm not talking hate, I'm talking common sense. Do you think anyone in 1997 would be able to buy a short 1 word .com domain name at minimum registration cost? Think about it. If they did, they'd have hit the lottery. Now on top of this a link is provided for an appraisal service & it is the first time this person is posting. If this is all an amazing coincidence, well isn't life grand & as I said she hit the lottery. Anyway, I'm not bothering to comment on this further.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

I'm not talking hate, I'm talking common sense. Do you think anyone in 1997 would be able to buy a short 1 word .com domain name at minimum registration cost? Think about it. If they did, they'd have hit the lottery. Now on top of this a link is provided for an appraisal service & it is the first time this person is posting. If this is all an amazing coincidence, well isn't life grand & as I said she hit the lottery. Anyway, I'm not bothering to comment on this further.

You know before I posted I read this site and saw that people were asking about or mentioning appraisal services. I had no idea it would somehow label me as a 'scammer' or an 'advertiser' of an appraisal site if I asked if anyone had used that one. I found it via a search engine. It looked more legit than the others. I'm happy to try ANY OTHER appraisal service that anyone might have personal experience with.

Don't be so bitter man. Yeah I guess I hit the lottery. Whatever. Sounds like you have sour grapes.

Sorry to interrupt this conversation, but...

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

This sounds like a Nigerian Scammer:

I tend to be very dubious of this post. Ten years ago was 1997. There simply were no short one word .com domains available then at a simple registration cost. Then your asking about appraisal. Plus the fact that this is your first post. Come on, get real. No one is this stupid.

That does sound pretty harsh. If you thought this was a scam, why didn't you report the post instead of replying to it? My suggestion is to report a post that you think is suspicious instead of replying to it.

Originally Posted by dave9713

Phil unless you can back your comments up stop scaring people away from the forums and **** off.

Same advice. Please, if you don't like someone's post, please report it and it will be dealt with as necessary.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

I'm not talking hate, I'm talking common sense. Do you think anyone in 1997 would be able to buy a short 1 word .com domain name at minimum registration cost? Think about it. If they did, they'd have hit the lottery. Now on top of this a link is provided for an appraisal service & it is the first time this person is posting.

It doesn't seem like common sense when you look at the registration and it is hers. In answer to your question, it seems like someone was indeed fortunate enough to get a one word domain (I don't remember her saying the price, nor is that relevant).

So I guess the next thing is that violet02 is spamming here to get notice for an appraisal service. Though I will admit that that has happened upon occasion, that the first post asks about someone's business so they can act innocent with their link dropping, IMO, that's not the case here.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

Anyway, I'm not bothering to comment on this further.

Thanks.

Dave

Thanks Dave.

If it is truly hers and she paid minimum registration cost for it, good for her and she's the first person I know to win the lottery. Having said that she ought to have known it would bring her a huge amount by now- I can't understand why she hasn't sold this & at worst gotten a lawyer or someone to sell it for her. If she didn't list the other appraisal place on here, I probably would not have made a comment. I honestly though do not care one way or the other. Too me though its like someone living in a nice house in Beverly Hills and wondering if its worth any money as they bought it for $50,000 20 years ago. But each to their own.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

If it is truly hers and she paid minimum registration cost for it, good for her and she's the first person I know to win the lottery. Having said that she ought to have known it would bring her a huge amount by now- I can't understand why she hasn't sold this & at worst gotten a lawyer or someone to sell it for her. If she didn't list the other appraisal place on here, I probably would not have made a comment. I honestly though do not care one way or the other. Too me though its like someone living in a nice house in Beverly Hills and wondering if its worth any money as they bought it for $50,000 20 years ago. But each to their own.

I've never wanted to sell it and until recently I'd never been offered more than 10k for it. Something is only worth as much as someone will pay you for it. I've also never advertised it for sale and by asking about appraisal services I'm STILL not advertising it for sale. I'm just inquiring about value.

You know you listed the appraisal services you used for your domain name... it seems that there's a problem with the one I asked about. If there is let me know. I don't want to pay for someone to appraise something if the service isn't worth the money they're charging for it. I'm still looking for one so if anyone can help refer me to or defer me from one that would be great!

I'm still blown away by the assumption that I paid this huge sum for this domain TEN years ago. That's a long time ago! I was talking to some co-workers today about this and they agreed that it wasn't that impossible to come by names like this ten years ago. I work in the tech industry. As Dave said above though it's irrelevant what I paid for it. I was just asking for help on a service. I'm sure this will kill you, not only did I pay the min. reg. fee for it, I could only afford to register it one year at at a time initially.

Anyways as I was saying above. I didn't buy it as an investment. I bought it to use it. I love the name and have been using it for ten years. I hadn't planned on selling it and when offered certain sums for it recently I decided to find out how much it really was worth rather than speculate. I don't buy domain names to profit, I buy them for personal/business use for myself. I do have a lawyer btw, he doesn't handle my domain per se, just anyone that tries to harass me about it.

Whoever offered you $10,000 for it tried to fleece you. I'd say we're talking about $50,000 to 100,000 or maybe even more. Personally I think these appraisal places are a joke too as they don't consider the brand that much, etc. Godaddy's was a total waste of money for me. Having said that, you should probably sell it on Godaddys
Aftermarket Auction & put the lowest you'd consider as $40,000. Good luck.

Originally Posted by Hershon2000

Whoever offered you $10,000 for it tried to fleece you. I'd say we're talking about $50,000 to 100,000 or maybe even more. Personally I think these appraisal places are a joke too as they don't consider the brand that much, etc. Godaddy's was a total waste of money for me. Having said that, you should probably sell it on Godaddys
Aftermarket Auction & put the lowest you'd consider as $40,000. Good luck.

Two days ago I got offered quite a bit more than 10k. All of my friends said oh my gosh sell it! I thought it HAS to be worth more than that, particularly if I keep getting bugged about if I want to sell it or not. I countered and told the guy my starting price was a bit higher just to see what he would say. He never replied. So then I came here to find what it's really worth. It peaked my interest.

I told someone once that offerd $10k that I wouldn't sell it for that since I thought it was worth more than that. And they said obviously it's not since no one has offered you that much and I said well that's fine I'm not selling it anyways. People get really MEAN when they try to hustle you for things.

Thanks for the pointer. Basically I've never tried to sell it, I've never advertised it for sale or anything. All offers have been unsolicited blind emails sent to maybe.com. Now if I actually tried to sell it, that may be a different story in terms of value. I'm in no rush right now.

The appraiser I mentioned at the top charges $99 per appraisal as opposed to the other sites for $14 or $19. That's why I was asking if anyone had used them. I saw that they were mentioned in USA Today and some other news publications but I may be suffering from if I pay more $$ then it must be better syndrome. I'm scared to start shelling out money for useless appraisals. It's like paying various agencies to give you a credit report. Plus I read some online articles about services and none of them mention these people. I just wanted to know if they were a scam or not.

After spending some more time reading it sounds like most of these sites are a scam. I also read an article about the aftermarket services of GoDaddy and Sedo and how they tend to cater to people that register with them (in the case of GoDaddy) with lower ticket items. I'm not sure how true that is since I haven't browsed it much but GoDaddy does seem to have a lot of mid XX,XXX listings. I'll keep reading....

Okay I did it, I paid for an appraisal. I won't say from who. I will say not from GoDaddy. I'll let you guys know what happens!