I am small business owner planning to start an ecommerce site with my SIL. We have our hearts set on a domain name that had been taken already. I recently contacted the owner and he has agreed to negotiate. His site is basically a blank page with no PR, no links, etc. He had not done anything with it for over a year. I offered him $250 but he said he wants $300. Is this too much to pay? I guess it also boils down to how badly I want it.
My other question is, being a novice, how do you actually transfer ownership? I contacted my ISP and they said that the original owner will open a domain management account for me and the transfer would take place that way. Shouldn't I be the one to open the account and not let him know my password, just my account number? Once the transfer has been made he would not be able to access and take back the domain?
The answer to your second question is tricky. But it can be done in 2 ways:
1. The current owner can indeed create an account and transfer it there him/herself.
This depends, though, if the domain name's current registrar offers this ability.
2. You can file an online transfer request with the current registrar and fulfill their
requirements. Depending on the registrar (if they're like the big guys), you create your
own account, make a deferred payment, then an authorization email will be sent to the
current owner for approval.
No. 2 will probably fit your need. But to be sure, contact the registrar for more info.
thank you for your reply! I will contact the registrar to see what they say.
I guess I should have offered him less to begin with. Live and learn.
I am also a newbie, but I've been contacted to sell one of my domains. They offered me $200, I asked for $5000. :)
Just be glad you didn't run into me :)
I just bought that domain and had plans for it though, so it changes things a bit.
like you said you guys have your heart set on it..
transfer is easy ..check who is and see which register the domain is at.. then sign up for an account at that register ...
then the owner can just "push" the name into your account.. takes 2 minutes instead of 2 weeks for a regular transfer MOST registers wil allow "push" these days.
All you do is send the old owner your email address and contact information(name address phone etc)-very important you use a good email address as that is where the register will contact you to let you know that someone is trying to transfer adomain to you ..
Were you able to sell it at your desired price or did you 2 haggle then meet? :)
Actually I posted a new thread on the whole thing. But I'm in the pretty powerful position of 'if I don't get my 5G's I can always work on building the site'. A site which I believe can give me much better return on investment in the long run.
I'll report back to the forum with more updates.
