I saw a couple posts on some other forums about people making a good amount of money from buying a domain name, holding onto it for awhile then selling it for lets say $20,000. Is this really possible? I have some really great domain names that are available on Godaddy.com and I was wondering how all this works. if I pay the $9.99/year do I really own the site? Can I sell it? Someone fill me in here on how this all works.

Thanks

Originally Posted by CashCrateElite

I saw a couple posts on some other forums about people making a good amount of money from buying a domain name, holding onto it for awhile then selling it for lets say $20,000. Is this really possible? I have some really great domain names that are available on Godaddy.com and I was wondering how all this works. if I pay the $9.99/year do I really own the site? Can I sell it? Someone fill me in here on how this all works.

Thanks

You have to know what makes a great domain name. A lot of people are wasting their money.

Go to Domain Name Journal - The Industry News Magazine at DNJournal.com and see what's actually being bought/sold. Do some research on keywords and generics.

Yes, once you pay the registration fee, it's all yours. You can put a web site on it or park it or sell it. As long as you pay the renewal fees, it's yours.

If you're hoping to sell a name in a few years for 20k+ you should be willing to spend 1k+ now

It's much much harder today that it was ten or even five years ago. Be prepared to spend several thousand now, sit on it for a few years, then resell later.

Most people making money from domain selling today don't sell for $20,000. It's usually sales of a few hundred or lower thousand, but that repeated with several domains.

Yes the .com market is heavily saturated. There are still good deals to be had out there. I like to watch Google Trends to pick up on new phrases and see if the domain is registered. Same goes for mainstream news.

what do you all think of the .us market?

I've also purchased a couple names since my last posts.. I'm in the process of selling my first domain (www.gofindhotels.net) for $500... Not bad when I only paid $10 at go daddy... Btw thank you for the article above...

$500 for that domain is a very good deal, in my opinion. Looks like you're off to a great start.

(personally, I don't know anything about the .us market... don't own a single one)

Well, the domain name industry is certainly nothing close to what it was--even 5 years ago when I first started back in 2003. The .com is surely a saturated market, while still proving to be the number one TLD everyone is after. Nowadays, it will be extremely hard to find quality .com domains. Prior research is a must if you are looking to buy a domain for a reg-fee. Doable, but certainly hard and will take quite some time on your behalf. Today, it is a lot easier to invest big bucks (not costing you an arm or a leg tho ) and then sitting on it for a while, frequently checking the market prices and letting them go at the ideal price at the ideal price for you.

Not an easy industry now, but still doable.

Yes it can be incredibly lucrative. Read all about Frank Schilling -- he's one of the biggest players in the industry.

But yes, it is a pretty saturated field and a lot of the bigger players are hundreds of miles ahead of you. That doesn't mean that your determination won't pay off, though.

The question is would you want to sell a domain name once it becomes worth something, personally, i'd want all the benefit for myself after building it up from scratch.

Originally Posted by alcozar

The question is would you want to sell a domain name once it becomes worth something, personally, i'd want all the benefit for myself after building it up from scratch.

This is true.

For me, it just depends on the topic of the site/name. If it's based on something I've interested in, I'd probably want to develop it. However, if it's something I had no interest in whatsoever, I'd probably sell the name.

No matter what field you're in, if you're good at it, it can be lucrative!!!

I'd say that generic domain names are best for selling, that and it all has to do with finding the right buyer, as they say one mans trash is another mans treasure.

Originally Posted by Moelman

I'd say that generic domain names are best for selling, that and it all has to do with finding the right buyer, as they say one mans trash is another mans treasure.

You are right. And the thing is that you may never know if there is anyone who wants to have your domain so much.

Last year, porn.com sold for $9.7 million. Someone made a nice profit on that sale.