What is trending at Escrow? Domain Name Holding transactions are continuing to become a substantial part of our business.
— Escrow.com (@Escrowcom) October 17, 2013
I think the Domain Holding Service offered by Escrow.com is an excellent tool that can help close deals. The way it works is that buyer and seller agree on a price and a payment plan, and Escrow.com holds the domain name in escrow as the buyer pays using the agreed upon payment schedule. Having this option gives an additional tool to a domain owner when a buyer is enthralled with a domain name but can’t afford the asking price.
According to a tweet from Escrow.com embedded above, it looks like it’s becoming very popular. I reached out to Escrow.com CEO Brandon Abbey to ask about the growth in this line of business, and he sent me this reply:
“Domain name holding and leasing has become a substantial part of our business. We started this offering at the request of a customer over 5 years ago and the Domain Community has really embraced it. We find ourselves doing not only the 6, 7 and 8 figure deals, but figuring out ways to accommodate customers no matter what their unique situation might be.”
One improvement I’d like to see is to have an automated email sent to the buyer to remind them about a payment. As far as I understand, the buyer is on his own when it comes to making payments, and I could see it being a challenge for a buyer to remember to submit the payment. Right now, it seems the onus is on the seller to ensure the buyer remembers to pay.
If a buyer doesn’t want to (or can’t) finance a payment using a company like Domain Capital, and the seller is willing to accept a payment plan over time, the Domain Holding Service is a great option.
Competing service eCOP.com take care of this, he sends many reminders to ensure the buyer do not forget to pay in time each installment.
I found ecop had limitations on credit card payment caps, and a more complicated user interface. Getting paid seems like a bit of an issue as well.
Not sure to understand what you say about payment when you can withdraw your balance at will.
This is one of my biggest hurdles when trying to get clients to use ecop to pay, the limitations on CC payments, if you can up these to $10K you will get a lot more business…
Fees when you pay ECOP
We allow credit card payments for amount up to 1,000 USD (3,000 USD for verified members) but need to add 4% to cover processing fees.
We allow PayPal payments for amount up to 1,000 USD (3,000 USD for verified members) but need to add 4% to cover PayPal fees.
The problem is how easy is to cancel a credit card payment, and how difficult is after to get the domain back. So allowing larger payments with credit card you are potentially opening the door to more and larger problems. This issue touch all escrow services, not only eCOP.com
Now, most of the time people are limited with the amount they can pay with their credit card, so the limitation is not a real problem as people willing to pay with credit card over $3K is a minority.
Sometimes we have authorized larger credit card payments but to protect us the domain has been left in escrow 6 months (the time a charge back is no longer possible).
At first I thought this was a story about Domain Holdings doing more transactions through Escrow.com…the name can be confusing.
Hadn’t thought about that, but it is interesting.
You are correct Andrew…with all the companies out there with the word “domain” in their name, we might want to think about renaming the product
On second thought, maybe my friends at DomainHoldings should thank me for the free advertising. 🙂
I understand why Igloo.com changed its name 🙂
I do too.
I thought the same thing Andrew
Maybe – Instead of calling it “Domain Holding Service”
Call it “Dot Holding Service”
~Patricia Kaehler — Ohio USA — DomainBELL
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Yes, I thought the same thing until I read Andrew’s comment.
Elliot, the scheduled payment reminders will be added to the service in the future. We will also be adding quite a few improvements to automate the process overall.
Andee,
Any chance this service will open up for smaller transactions? I have a low 5-figure deal that requires a 12 month payment plan and it would be great if we could use Escrow.com rather than a competitor.
Yes, Same here many deals in the $10-25K range, that would work well with this, At the current time we use Epik as the best platform for the smaller deals.
Use eCOP.com, there is no limitations for payment plans!
Keep me posted on that!
We actually take them at any dollar amount but we charge a fee based on a 75k transaction. Automation will help us lower the fees.
I think escrow needs to lift the CC limit to $10K, $5K is getting sort of low in the marketplace, and hindering a lot of deals, as more deals get caught up in accounting departments, when employees can’t just expense it via their CC, and have to ask for a direct wire, just what I have come across in some recent $5-10K deals…
@Ron, If we have a history with the buyer, we can open up the credit card limit. However, the higher fees tend to scare some away.
Nice to see more evidence of domain aftermarket sales or sales prices picking up at Escrow.
Love it!
Genius!
Maybe – Instead of calling it “Domain Holding Service”
Call it “Dot Holding Service”
~Patricia Kaehler — Ohio USA — DomainBELL
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Ecop in my opinion is not as good as Escrow.. Escrow seems to work well.
I love escrow.com and use them often, but for financing / lease type deals I always use ecop.com because all the deals I have done are $1,000 – $10,000 so escrow.com is not an option.
Has Escrow.com or eCop.com had any problems with CC chargebacks ?
Are non-wire buyer-payment payouts to sellers delayed because of
possible chargeback issues ?
Will the domain be “usable” by the buyer during the holding period?
eDomainer – when I do a financing sale or lease that uses escrow I switch the dns to the buyer’s info ahead of time, so they can setup their site. I have never done that type of deal using escrow.com, but with ecop.com you can also ask them to switch the dns while it is in escrow.
excitemental – It is not so much an issue of which escrow service is better, ecop.com offers a bunch of things escrow.com does not offer at all such as financing/lease transactions for small dollar amounts. Sometimes I use escrow.com, sometimes I ecop.com.