The quality of domain names on the auctions has decreased tremendously and the warning for each auction is way too short. 15 days (to view domain names on these auctions) is not enough for me to make arrangements to buy these domain names.

Aside from that there is multiple login requirements to sign up for a moniker and snap names account confusing the hell out of me. If there was one site running one auction with at least a month and half warning I think we’d see the prices are still the same.

The quality of domain names put on these auctions definitely has to be revisited. I see domain names with dashes, .net, .biz. .info being auctioned at these live auctions and I wonder if that is the best they can do.

That is just what I see from my point of view.

“If i looked I am sure i could find data that suggests the complete opposite.”

Ok Steven, I’ll call you on that….please look and present the data that shows the complete opposite.

If i looked I am sure i could find data that suggests the complete opposite. Numbers can be used in a number of ways. I think you need to look at the external variables such as:

Where was it sold?

Who bought it?

What was the reason for it selling?

In a new era of development, does the names have legs?

How long has it been available on the market?

I mean, most of these questions I ask myself before i buy a name. So, IMO, to say the market is going up or down is misleading.

Obviously, buying names has an opportunity cost associated with them. As I have been saying for at least 6 months, domains will take a fall and probably have because other ways to make more money long term because the state of economy. Once the domain prices come down, domains will be he bargains and you will see people buying them again in large quantities.

I am personally very anxious to see the TRAFFIC auction list and seeing if peoples expectations have come down or if everyone still thinks their name is GOLD

Snoopy,

Those examples do not show a trend. They only prove one thing for sure. The buyer paid too MUCH for the names the first time.

The idea of buying a name at the largest domain auctions and trying to flip them is crazy.

Just because those people lost money does NOT mean that that all names have gone down in value. I think the market is just learning to evalate

Yet it is a generic and commonly used term so in my opinion, the domain is worth $5,000-$10,000 and I think this year it got its true value.

Out of all the 4 domains you listed, only eob.com appears to be more valued than it sold for, last week. Many sellers unfortunately pay high price for a 3 high grade letters (without q,x,z, etc in it) assuming there will be lot of end-user buyers for it. EOB might sound like all high premium 3 letter domain but if you dig deeper, you will see that EOB does not have much acronyms and abbreviations to sell for high price – even with 1.6 mil Google results. There are no level 1 potential buyers and there are only 2 level 3 potential buyers (not much likely to buy) I can find – eob.dk and eob-london.co.uk. In my opinon, EOB.com is worth $10-15k and it was a bad buy at $17.5k. I am not trying to defend the domain investments but all I am saying is that there will always be few examples of losses from last years.
If you check, you probably will find some domains that were bought for higher in 2006 than sold in 2007.. like you did for 2007-2008.

I am also a domainer in Vancouver and have been in the industry from past several years but I do not hold a very big portfolio. My strategy is focus on few very high premium domains, like country domains.

Those examples do not show a trend. They only prove one thing for sure. The buyer paid too MUCH for the names the first time.

The idea of buying a name at the largest domain auctions and trying to flip them is crazy.

Just because those people lost money does NOT mean that that all names have gone down in value. I think the market is just learning to evalate “true” quality a little better.

And as for “prime” domains, Adam is correct – the article is referring to names like property.com.

Cheers, M. Thanks for the feedback, comments…

Again it all boils down to what is considered a prime domain. A single word generic like property.com is a good example. A city name is another. But where property.com is at the top, other domains containing the word property might also be considered prime or close to it. After that, the question of what is a prime domain and what is not gets harder to answer.