In February of this year, Verisign announced that the wholesale price for .com domain names will be rising by 7% on September 1, 2022. The wholesale cost, which is paid by domain registrars like Namecheap and GoDaddy, will be raised from $8.39 to $8.97. Domain registrars add their own margin to that amount, and the total is what domain registrants pay to register, renew, and transfer .com domain names.
For domain investors, this additional 7% fee can be impactful depending on the size of a domain portfolio. Andrew Rosener tweeted a good reminder for investors who may have forgotten about the looming price increase:
The domain registrar is the most important domain industry company. My domain registrars are tasked with keeping my domain names safe and resolving to the right location. My registrar choice is based on several factors in varying order:
My preference is to keep my domain names consolidated at one domain registrar, but I use several registrars for my portfolio. Auction wins and private acquisitions are the primary reasons for why I use multiple domain registrars.
I saw a tweet today that inspired this article:
Domain names in my Network Solutions account show a status of “Pending Transfer” even though they transferred to GoDaddy.
More than two years ago, I wrote about the problem of ghost records at Network Solutions. Although the back-end and control panel at Network Solutions seems to have been updated and possibly modernized since I wrote the article, the problem of ghost records in my Network Solutions account still persists.
For those who are unaware, a “ghost record” is when a domain name appears to exist in an account at a domain registrar after it was already removed from the account due to an expiration or transfer. At best, these records are more of an annoyance than anything else, cluttering an account with domain names that do not exist there.
Network Solutions has a pretty glaring bug that needs to be addressed. Ordinarily, I would simply report the bug in private and hope it gets fixed, but in this case, I am going to highlight the issue. I want to make sure that others who see this will know it’s not just them and hopefully just a bug that is being addressed.
Earlier this week, I started a transfer of 17 domain names from Network Solutions to GoDaddy. These domain names were all won at NameJet, and I consolidate my portfolio at GoDaddy every few months. The transfers were started, and I approved and confirmed the transfers when I received the email.
Rick Schwartz shared the content of an email he received from Register.com, in which he was given a .Site domain name. A Whois search reveals Rick owns LastLaughs.com, which is registered at Register.com. The email to Rick offered him LastLaughs.Site, under the guise of Register.com’s “Brand Protection Program.”
This is one of the biggest gTLD models, STUFFING accounts w/ #Domains nobody asked for or ordered!
I have to act not to get it stuffed in my account??!!
I have to opt-out??BULLSHIT!!
Many companies will be fooled into paying renewals for years! #SCAM #DomainNames #Unethical pic.twitter.com/Haqu5xLYvL
— Rick Schwartz 👑 The DomainKing® 👑 Since 1995 👑 (@DomainKing) March 4, 2021
