Trying to register an expired/ deleted domain, but it's not available?

[draggar]

I've been watching a domain name that I could build a community on (to go along with several others). The registrar had it, but wanted too much $$$ for it (more than your average backorder / auction site), so I waited for it to expire.

They no longer had it (woohoo!). I check the whois information and it says that it is available (woohoo!) but when I try to register it with my registrar, it says it is not available (eh?). OK, no biggie, so I check the drop auction / backorder sites and none of them have it.

Is this normal for a newly expired / deleted domain? Should I wait longer or is it possible that an auction site has picked it up already?

[timwestla]

Yeah that is normal. My suggestion is to go ahead and back order from a service that automatically snatches the names when they are available.