I have been domain investing for 10 years now. For the last 8 years I been active and paying attention. But I’ve really only figured out what I’m doing in the last 5. I admit I was inspired to look at my purchases over the last 12 months by a tweet from Rick Schwartz that contained his recent purchases. I took a look and thought “I think I’ve done just as well” . So I started looking and putting the list together.
Here are the names I’ve purchased in approximately the last year
Blowtorch.com
IslandSolar.com
MonkeyWrench.com
Dustpan.com
TheBigIsland.com
Uncomfortable.com
GardenGifts.com
XUSK.com
LeafSpot.com
WMHC.com
WSWC.com
OLLB.com
TNCM.com
ICBH.com
ButterflyWeed.com
LSFA.com
CBLC.com
PDMC.com
CMOT.com
GMLA.com
HHON.com
Christmas.ws (came with reg with until 2099)
BLRA.com
GNBC.com
RootSaver.com
InstantHeat.com
TheLawnService.com
Grower.info
Before I give you my takeaways after looking at my own list I’ll throw in a little background. I’ve said it a thousand times but I’ll state it one more time. I have never put in one cent of my “outside’ money into domains. Every penny spent has come from selling domains, blogging, or my small sites. It is a long slow process that has taken years. If I don’t have the money I don’t buy. This year I had to protect a large amount of my bankroll for another purchase. I have put in an offer on a piece of property that is waiting for someone else to buy the other section for sale. If it goes through I have to write a check for $20K within the week. My wife doesn’t want to be a part and I’m on my own on the purchase. Like everything in life, if I spend it on a domain the land will close the next day and leave me scrambling for money. Even worse have to ask my wife for something she told me know ahead of time. I tell you this because it left me a little “poorer” than last year and I passed on a quite of bit of lesser value names that normally I would buy.
I had planned on buying a lot more names at lower values and playing the Brandbucket/BIN Afternic game but I had some early success buying private names and decided to concentrate on those this year. As discussed on DomainSherpa, I bought MonkeyWrench, Blowtorch, TheBigIsland, and Dustpan all privately. A few of them took months and years to acquire. I obviously filled the portfolio with LLLL.coms as well. I am particular on what kind of LLLL.com I buy and you’ll notice a pattern of what kind of letters I like. Not going to see any Js or Ks in my names. I buy them because I think they hold value as well as any domain and I sell one or two a year for $7K plus which pays for most of my purchases. The LLLL.coms you see above were two sales rolled back into more LLLL.
As for asking prices on these, I am much much more patient than I have ever been. Everything is going very well and I don’t need money nearly as much as I did while building my portfolio. This site is doing fine and I have been selling a domain or two a month. Add that to my sites and various other Internet income and I have a decent bankroll to spend each month
This month for example. I should have one closing today for $2500 combined with $2500 worth of names I sold at DropCatch. Add in this site and my other sites and I have over $10K to put in to domains without having to reduce the portfolio value very much. I feel this is the secret to my domain investing career. Selling domains yet increasing the quality of the portfolio. The domain I sold for $2500 I bought for $17 on Godaddy 5 or 6 years ago. The other advantage I have is I don’t have to take any money out to pay for stuff. Although I do. I do this to make my life more enjoyable so I take money out to do exactly that. And if I miss a domain purchase or two because I did I had some fun I’m ok with that. But I don’t have any reoccurring bills or payments in which I have to withdraw money. This ability to reinvest lets my portfolio and my money grow at a much bigger rate than someone that has bills to pay. It also takes the pressure off of selling and in general, takes away all pressures. This is all bonus. Mums pay the bills, botany.com pays for the thrills.
Feel free to share some of the better names you’ve purchased this year.
The whois showed that LeafSpot.com expired on July 21, 2017.
Do you plan to dropped it or forget to renew?
I forgot to renew. But just did. Thank you Fuadiansyah
That’s a fairly neat set of 4Ls in that list, just my kind of names – quad western premium letters.
Bought quite a few .ws domains myself, which is surprising considering I was planning on getting out of .ws – gadget, interactive, offers, royalty, society, price & exhibition (already own the plural for the last two).
But the one I’m happiest with is Fare.one, been trying to get this keyword in any tld without breaking the bank for a while now.
Samit,
Might I ask why you would want a .one name at all?
Shane, I like good brands, irrespective of the tld. I must say here that ntlds consist less than 0.1% of my portfolio.
After hearing the word “regime” so many times on the news today, I’m thinking about registering TokenRegime.com
Man, I know you had to shift your domain strategy due to finances but this portfolio is excellent. You should’ve started this sooner.
I’d take this portfolio over Rick’s any day of the week and twice on Sunday. All hail the new king!
The famous (infamous?) unconfortable.com! Glad you have an adjective that fits your philosophy. I bought uncontrite.com.
Do you think:
Zezd
Ynvo
Tugv . com’s
has any value?
Thanks.
Thanks for your list and I agree with Fhall that I would take your list over Ricks any day. Here’s a few I picked up this year on auction….
webuylogs.com
leafdirect.com
debtfreeformula.com
wepayclaims.com
Have a good one and best of luck to everyone!
LeafDirect.com should work out well – congrats!
I have been purchasing a lot these days. Most of them are to stay for quite some time. Few names I’ve purchased this year:
ActualDate.com
AdvancedProsthetic.com
AntivirusProfessional.com
AugmentedDesktop.com
AutisticPeople.com
Betsinternational.com
CourierRobo.com
EndpointFirewall.com
GrainChips.com
HolographicBroadcast.com
LevitationSystem.com
LogActivity.com
LogisticRobot.com
NowMessenger.com
RuggedPrinters.com
SelfRepairCar.com
SlovakiaBank.com
SmileCorrection.com
I don’t actually remember having visited website with having 3L or 4L’s which has random alphabets( that makes no sense or words). For example If someone would say best.com is great domain name, I guess everyone would agree on that. But if someone would say WKLRG.com(for example) is a good go, I would usually not go for that website.
Human brain’s are trained to understand the meaning and words that we can stuck into our minds lasting long enough that we can catch the word back when we hear it back. So if a WKLRG.com isn’t a big company, it is most likely i would never visit that website.
On the other side( future prospects) – 4L’s are not much left to grab and even I don’t know if 5L’s has also had hit it’s limits but in near future lets’ say 20 years in future, those 4L’s ( with no words or sense) might do well. Because of scarcity of the domain names that would be available with 4L’s( for example) at that time.
Nice set of names Shane.
Some of my registrations and acquisitions:
VRGem.com
DriverlessVR.com
PrintedVR.com
PrintedOffices.com
Coinek.com
CurrencyStars.com
InspireByExample.com
ExteriorKitchen.com
JerseyHeights.com