Long Term Domain Holdings

FAUWhen you’re investing in a speculative domain name, keep in mind that you could have your money on the sidelines for a long time. If you are paying registration fee, it’s not a lot of money to worry about. However, if you buy dozens or hundreds of domain names at registration fee, or if you buy a domain name for a lot of money, it could be burdensome.

This morning, I was reading an article in CNN about researchers at Florida Atlantic University who are currently in the early stages of attempting to generate power from the Gulf Stream. The project uses ocean turbines much like companies harness wind power with wind turbines, and if it’s successful, there could be many ocean turbines installed underwater throughout the world. Fellow domain investor had learned about this potential power source and registered OceanTurbines.com nearly a year ago. Smart thinking!

The only downside is that the article said “If the pilot program is successful, it could take another five to 10 years before the technology can be implemented.” In speaking with Stephen, I know he has a number of similar domain names – like SeaTurbines.com, and his company is all over the solar business. Stephen knows his names won’t be worth big bucks for a few years, but his well-capitalized company is able to hold out and wait for the value to increase.

If you are buying speculative domain names or an expensive speculative domain name, it’s important to realize that your money could be tied up in these domain names for a long time. You need to figure out whether you can afford to hold out or not. I know a lot of people own portfolios of these names, and each year it becomes harder to renew, but they do it because they’ve already figured the previous years are a sunk cost and don’t want to lose their investment.

If you are going to need the money in the short or medium term, perhaps it’s not a smart investment – even if you think it might be the next big thing. Every days something new is the “next big thing,” and you can go broke pretty easily if you are always trying to register everything related to it.

Elliot Silver
Elliot Silver
About The Author: Elliot Silver is an Internet entrepreneur and publisher of DomainInvesting.com. Elliot is also the founder and President of Top Notch Domains, LLC, a company that has closed eight figures in deals. Please read the DomainInvesting.com Terms of Use page for additional information about the publisher, website comment policy, disclosures, and conflicts of interest. Reach out to Elliot: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

6 COMMENTS

  1. I saw this article researching for my blog. I see more investment value in l/t domain sitting on green names than trend names now, any of them.
    I say structure some short term green information and other sites to generate the pennies per day to afford the renewals.
    and get the bulk rate!

  2. i view these investments as penny stocks – devote a very small pct of total portfolio – could be a great l/t investment or could be worth -0-.

    i recently reg’d on the drop: climatepoint.com.

  3. The best way to invest in domains is to diversify your domain acquisitions with different time frames in mind. I have domains which I expect to sell in the near future, some that I believe will increase in value in the next 1-3 years, and others. like real estate domains related to Latin America, which I believe will reach their potential resale value in the next 5-10 years.

    However, it is ALWAYS a speculation. At the moment there is no place for sure domain liquidity. So regardless of your expected time line, it could be much longer than you think before you can sell at all, never mind for the price you want.

    In the end…the bulk of your investments should be in domains which are timeless. That is the only way to protect your investment.

    City Names and other Geo related names will always be in demand, like my recent acquisition: Pedasi.com (Pedasi, Panama). However, trend domains may not, like another recent acquisition: GreenCarWash.com

  4. Past renewals are a sunk cost but the idea of losing and investment can be a expensive one at some point its just throwing good money after bad . A lottery ticket is not an investment neither is a portfolio of names that lose you money year after year even if you can cover the cost its still costing you money.

  5. Hi El-Silver,

    Thanks for the kudos on my ocean energy domains. I actually bought them over three years ago. Then I did a Monte Cahn interview on Domainmaster, and the sneaky domain auction expert itched me on to say what I was buying, and I admitted I was investing in “future trend domains”.

    Now, it’s extremely hard to find a new technology phrase that’s not bought already. Try to find a noun with the adjective “GREEN” in it in the .com extension. Good luck. Any domain name with the word “Green” in it by 2010 will be worth over $1000.

    The trick to buying future trend domains, and when to expect maturity is a complicated procedure. It’s like putting two hot babes in a 4×4 foot box, and then making a tiger jump out.

    When I buy my future trend domains, I do TONS of research on the phrase, the technology, the prodservs X consumer response ratio, and establish that the domain name, even bought OOTB, will eventually come to describe a company’s prodservs.

    I’ve already made six figures on these types of domains since 2005, most selling under $5000. Those same domains will be worth five times that much in a few years. The buyers were people directly involved in the technology.

    I can’t give away my secrets on how to find future trend domains, but anyone can contact me if they want to learn.

    NOTE: The article by CNN Tech dept didn’t touch on the fact that ocean/wave energy production has been considered for many years. My lure for El-Silver’s readers to my blog and to discuss futuretrenddomains.com service is this nice little article a few days ago in Forbes magazine:
    ++++++
    FORBES/WOLFE Weekly Insider:
JUL.17.2009 by Josh Wolfe (email: nanotech@forbes.com )
    “The future really is here, its just unevenly distributed. Today’s courier is robotics researcher Hod Lipson of my alma mater Cornell University. Our recently published Forbes interview is below. Hod is learning a lot about consciousness and creativity by teaching robots to work. And if you thought the Roomba was a consumer electronics novelty, give a nod to Hod and what he’s working on.” (more at the article’s link: http://www.newsletters.forbes.com/servlet/ControllerServlet?Action=DisplayPage&Locale=en_US&id=ProductDetailsPage&SiteID=es_764&productID=53889200&pgm=3897100 )

    I hope that came out okay on El’s site…

    Anyway, my warning to any domainers wanting to get into this arena of making money from future trend domains… first hire Successclick to tell you how to do it. Second, if you don’t learn how to get the right domains, you’ll waste a lot of money buying crap. Third, keep reading Elliotsblog.com to stay up to date on what’s making money.

    Pardon me, *ahem*, I gotta go so I can prepare to prove up what I’m saying here. whhhhhuuuuut!!!!???

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