Domain has now sold.

I’ve decided to list EnglandVacations.com for sale. The BIN price is just $8,500. The cost of a family traveling to England is in the thousands, so commission on a single vacation booking can be hundreds of dollars. If a small site is built, and a white label travel affiliate is used, EnglandVacations.com can be easily used as a travel portal/engine. Add some unique content about great places to visit in England, and run with it. This name was registered eight years ago.

Here are some recent comparison sales for similar domain names (courtesy of DNSalePrice.com:

CaribbeanVacations.com $130,000
EuropeanVacations.com $85,000
IrelandVacations.com $17,250
AustraliaVacations.com $16,000
AsianVacations.com $15,000* Sold via ElliotsBlog.com
BudgetVacations.com $10,300
CanadaVacations.com $9,600
FijiVacation.com $9,200
BahamaVacations.com $8,188
SwitzerlandVacation.com $7,500
IsraelVacations.com* Sold via ElliotsBlog.com (price not revealed)

I think the most comparable sale on the list is probably IrelandVacations.com, which recently sold for $17,250. The first person to post “sold” in the comment section of my blog will get EnglandVacations.com at a great price.

Much like New York City taxi cab medallions, which are always highly coveted at auction, category killer domain names will always defy current market conditions. While I do think much of the domain industry is in the midst of a slow down, there are always going to be sectors of the industry that perform particularly well, regardless of of the health of the economy. Because category killer generic .com domain names are irreplaceable, when one is put on the market, the price can go through the roof.

On the flip side of things, I think people are spending less money on average domain names, which may be felt by many in the industry, since a vast majority of people own average domain names. I also believe some people think their domain names are worth more than the market will pay, and they are setting the prices far too high to have success. I am not really referring to a specific domain name here, but I am speaking in general terms. If you are going to entrust a domain auction house to sell your domain name, and you are going to allow them to lock the name up for 60 or 90 days after the auction, you might as well make the price reasonable.

Unless you own a genuine category killer domain name, I think you might want to reconsider your asking prices. Instead of trying to get rich on a single domain name, why not reduce your price, sell a name for a handsome profit margin, and reinvest it in other great domain names? There are plenty of times I have sold names for prices I believe are far less than optimal, but I have reinvested in more and better domain names every time, and I haven’t regretted a sale yet.

I am dropping my prices from last week’s Domain Clearance Sale. These are the lowest prices the names will get, so if you are interested, please act now. The following domain names are on sale at below bargain basement prices:

Metabolizers.com and FatMetabolizers.com - $2,400 $1,999
UnemploymentLine.com - $2,400 $1,999
RefinancingFast.com - $500 $399
CreditReportTracker.com - $600 $499
Crooning.com - $400 $299
Prodding.com - $300 $199
Spumantes.com/.net/.org/.info - $900 $499
BeerPairings.com - $400 $299
AFYC.com - $350 $199
CheapestPaintballs.com - $250 $149
OCDCounselors.com - $400 $299
EXMR.com - $300 $199
GraduateStudents.org - SOLD
MUIW.COM - $125 $85
MVUW.COM - $100 $85
PUGV.com - $130 $99
PYVN.com - $100 $85
SkiTeachers.com - $450 $300
SouthCarolinaSite.com - $150 $85
WEGH.com - $250 $150
WFIY.com - $200 $125
TUSV.com - $150 $99
PeepshowBooth.com and PeepshowBooths.com - $250 $99
HotAirBalloonists.com - $250 $99

I’ve decided once again to sell some more of my domain names that I won’t have a chance to develop in the foreseeable future, and I am slashing the prices to close some quick deals. The following domain names are on sale at bargain basement prices:

Metabolizers.com and FatMetabolizers.com - $2,400
UnemploymentLine.com - $2,400
RefinancingFast.com - $500
CreditReportTracker.com - $600
Crooning.com - $400
Prodding.com - $300
Spumantes.com/.net/.org/.info - $900
BeerPairings.com - $400
AFYC.com - $350
CheapestPaintballs.com - $250
OCDCounselors.com - $400
EXMR.com - $300
GraduateStudents.org - $60
MUIW.COM - $125
MVUW.COM - $100
PUGV.com - $130
PYVN.com - $100
SkiTeachers.com - $450
SouthCarolinaSite.com - $150
WEGH.com - $250
WFIY.com - $200
TUSV.com - $150
PeepshowBooth.com and PeepshowBooths.com - $250
HotAirBalloonists.com - $250

Due to the considerable number of inquiries about listing domain names for sale on my blog (most frequently from people I don’t know), I’ve decided to allow it. If you are interested in listing a domain name for sale on my blog in a blog post, there will be a non-refundable listing fee of $250 per domain name. This fee will include your write-up about the domain name and will include your contact information. I am not a domain broker, so there is no commission for selling your domain name on my blog.

I do maintain the right to reject any domain sales requests that aren’t appropriate for my blog (blatant trademark violations for example). For further information, drop me a note. Depending on the response to this, the fee may increase at my discretion.

I saw that CreditScoreTracker.com currently has a pre-auction bid of $2,500 at the DRT Live auction. In that respect, I would like to offer CreditReportTracker.com for just $1,000. I think these names are fairly comparable, but I am happy to give a great price to sell the name. First person to post “sold” in the comment section of the blog gets the name, which is registered at Moniker.

When an end user contacts a domain owner to purchase a domain name, the challenge of negotiating a sales price begins. Oftentimes, the domain owner has a certain sales price in mind, while the buyer has a number in his head, either determined by his budgetary requirements or his own personal constraints. A domain seller needs to play part psychologist and part savvy businessman to determine how to read between the lines of an email to yield the best possible price, but to ensure the negotiation isn’t ended prematurely.

When the negotiation dance has begun, I think less attention should be paid to the buyer and more to the domain name. Sure, if the buyer really needs the name and has an unlimited budget, the sky could be the limit for the sales price. However, if the seller misreads this need, a sale could be easily lost by drastically over-pricing the domain name. One of the most important things to keep in mind when negotiating is that category killer names (such as LaptopComputers.com, HomeMortgage.com…etc) usually can’t be replaced easily, and the price can be reflective of this . Brandable names (such as CoolGadgets.com, FunTrips.com…etc), on the other hand, can usually be replaced much more easily, and the buyer may go out and find an alternative at a much more attractive price rather than over-pay for this type of name.

An example of this was when I was looking to acquire a home decorating domain name a few months ago. I negotiated with a few domain owners to try to buy a brandable name for an affiliated site I wanted to build. I am sure each of three names I inquired about received no natural traffic, and they weren’t developed, so the true value was in the name and what a buyer would pay. While two of the names were very over priced and not even worth making a counteroffer, a third person replied “you sold xxxxxxxxx.com for $x,xxx and the price of this name is a little less,” which I found to be ridiculous since the names were completely unrelated. Just because I can afford to pay more for a domain name, doesn’t mean I will pay more, especially because I have a feel for domain valuation. Needless to say, I decided to simply register an expired name for $7.44, and I bought DecoratingDiscounts.com, which is much better than the others in a cost/benefit analysis.

Yes, a domain name is a one of a kind piece of Internet property that only one entity can own. If an end-user tries to buy the domain name, the seller should balance his knowledge of the end user’s finances with the value of the domain name. Sure, great deals can happen, but just like in a game of double down video poker, you never know what price is going to lose you a sale. People don’t like to be taken advantage of, and if they feel the seller has increased the price simply because of who the buyer is, the negotiation may be ended.

For me, when I buy a domain name that I plan to sell, I have a value in mind. If/when I receive an offer in that range, chances are good that I will sell it.  While it’s great when people sell a domain name a huge sum - and there are plenty of stories like that, I know there are many more stories where the buyer says “no thanks” and moves on to another name. There have been plenty of times when I would have paid more for a domain name, but the asking price was unreasonable. Sure, name your own price if the money isn’t life changing and you don’t need to sell your domain names. But if you are “rich on paper,”  over pricing domain names isn’t going to help put you in a strong cash position.

Jeremiah was a bullfrog… and a biblical figure… and a common first name… and now you can own the domain name Jeremiah.com for just $55,000 $39,000 - or if you submit a best offer that’s accepted by the owner via Ebay. Some recent first name .com sales include:

Jacob.com $75,000 (I think this was a steal)
Marilyn.com $45,000
Doug.com $45,000
Kathy.com $65,000

There have already been two competitive offers placed in the first 8 hours of listing, so I would be surprised if it makes it until the listing end date of April 29th.

Sing it with me…

“Joy to the world, all the boys and girls, joy to all the fishies in the deep blue sea, joy to you and me…”

On April 4th, I offered the domain name UnemploymentLine.com for $5,750. The name didn’t sell then, so I am going to drop the price on it today. The new price is a crazy $3,500. This is a cool name, and with the current recession, unemployment is a hot button issue.

First person to respond “sold” in the comment section will get the name.