Parked domain with a PR5?

How'd that happen?

[netmeg]

I acquired a parked domain name as partial repayment for an unrelated debt. The domain name has NEVER been used for a site (I know, because I'm the one who took it out for its original owner around three years ago, and I *checked* - plus it's kind of a made-up phrase) and it just sat there unused the entire time, until maybe three months ago when he put it into a parking program - where it never earned a cent.

Anyway, he turned the domain over to me last month, and I thought I could do something with it eventually - and much to my surprise, it appears to have a TBPR of 5 already, with no backlinks or anything. That doesn't seem right. Possibly it's just a PR glitch, although I've checked it several times over the past couple weeks, from several different places, and it always reports as PR5.

How weird is that?

[callivert]

Are you sure it has no links, or are you just assuming that because it's never been used?
It could have inbounds, especially if it's a nice domain. You'd be surprised at the number of stray links out there.

[netmeg]

I looked in Google, Yahoo, MSN and everywhere I could think of. Couldn't find a one.

[blueheelers]

You may Google for "fake page rank checker" and verify the domain has a legitimate page rank. If you 301/302 redirect a domain, Google will display the destination domain's page rank.

Many of the PR domains sold on Ebay are this case.

[netmeg]

I'll check for that. But honest, this domain just sat there in a Dotster account, with my own nameservers on it (the ones I use for parking, not the ones I use for actual sites) for three years. It was never 301'd or 302'd or any of that.

I suspect it's a glitch that will disappear with the next TBPR, and I don't really care all that much, except that it's a mystery. But heck, if it stays PR5, I might move something on to it.

[havaco]

We just discovered the same thing with one of our unused domains, although we do redirect that domain to an active site using meta refresh. Could that be the reason it has a PR5 with no inbound links, as with a 301/302 redirect? The HTML redirect sends the domain to a PR5 site.

[Bennie]

Set up a link to a new domain and see if the link pop passes.