I recently sold a domain name I owned for several years after an email discussion with the buyer. During our negotiation, at least three people from the buyer’s side were involved in the discussion. Once we agreed on a price, I wasn’t sure whose email address to use for the transaction and had a feeling it could be someone else entirely.
Because of the relatively low value of the deal (under $5k), I decided to use Dan.com for the transaction. In my experience, buyers have had few difficulties with payment, and Dan support works with the buyer to facilitate the domain transfer instead of having to do that myself. Despite a higher cost % vs. escrow, I have found there to be fewer speed bumps.
Because it was unclear who would be managing the transaction, I did not do the traditional lead import at Dan.com. Instead, I opted to get a checkout link via Afternic. Since Afternic and Dan both offer the same 5% transaction fee on imported leads, it was essentially the same cost and I figured I would see how the checkout link works.
To create a checkout link, you click the 3 dots under “Actions” within your Afternic account. You can see that in this screenshot:
Interestingly, the checkout link provided is a Dan.com link instead of Afternic or GoDaddy. This was fine in my case because I had told the buyer we would be using Dan.com. I also mentioned the company is owned by GoDaddy to offer reassurance about a brand they probably never heard of before.
The next day, the buyer told me payment was made, but I had not received an email from Afternic or Dan. I acknowledged their email and let them know I was awaiting a payment confirmation. A very short time later, I received a ‘Congrats, [domain name] has sold via Fast Transfer!‘ email from Afternic. I then received a “Sorry to see you go,” transfer confirmation email from GoDaddy indicating the domain name transferred to Dan’s registrar to facilitate the transfer of the domain name to the buyer. The following day, I received the payment email from Afternic indicating the payment had been sent to me.
From my side as the seller, this was a pretty easy transaction and allowed me to get the deal started without having to know which person on the buyer’s side was handling the transaction. It was also nice that the domain name was transferred automatically since it was Fast Transfer authorized.
One thing I would have liked to see is the domain name listing automatically removed from Dan and marked as sold after the payment was made. This did not happen, so I manually removed the listing myself. Not a big deal.
All in all, the checkout link was a little bit easier than the lead import option given the fact that the transfer is entirely handled by GoDaddy.
Its pretty nice and easy feature. I wish I try one day when someone insist to buy my domains 🙂
Thanks for sharing the great experience.
I am experiencing the same nightmare now
I sold my domain instalador.com through Afternic over a month ago and have yet to receive my $4,000 payment. Despite confirming that all my banking details are correct and providing all necessary information, they’ve failed to process the payment and haven’t communicated the reasons behind the delay. After multiple follow-ups and vague responses, it’s starting to feel like they’re stalling. The fact that they can’t process a $4,000 payment begs the question of whether this is due to mismanagement, incompetence, or even insolvency.