To all domain portfolio holders

LetDomains · Apr 2, 2015

Hi guys,

I'm starting a new site which will allow customer to lease domains. It's an excellent way for people with large portfolios to monetise them without actually having to lose the asset itself.
If anyone with a portfolio of at least 250 domains is interested DM me. Alternatively if you own a smaller portfolio but with high value domains also feel free to DM me. Any questions feel free to ask.

Thanks

SF · Apr 2, 2015

Can we have a look at your website?

bonusmedia · Apr 2, 2015

What happens if a customer leases a domain and burns it with spam?

nick-harper · Apr 2, 2015

Or if they make it absolutely massive and you take it back?

LetDomains · Apr 3, 2015

nick-harper said:
Or if they make it absolutely massive and you take it back?

In the licence contract. there will be a buy out option. that you agree on a price before leasing the domain.

The website is under construction and hopefully launch in july/august

If the licensor who is renting the domain name. trys to burn out the domain for whatever reason. you can take action by changing the nameservers and the contracted will be terminated.

bonusmedia · Apr 3, 2015

LetDomains said:
The website is under construction

Famous last words

Will be interesting to discuss it when you have something up and running

pugdomains · Apr 3, 2015

bonusmedia said:
Famous last words

Will be interesting to discuss it when you have something up and running

Can't blame the bloke for making sure the demand exists prior to building it though, seen tonnes of people throw cash at projects without testing the waters.

Personally I wouldn't be interested in leasing out a premium domain, just as well that I don't own many/any of those I suppose. And that's where I think the flaw in this type of system lies....

.... domainers would be happy to throw their mediocre / lower quality domains at a project like this, so that they pay for themselves and stand a better chance of a sale.

But their top quality domains, the ones that they know a buyer will come for one day, or the ones which they know have certain li*****ty on domainlore.... I'm not so sure about, due to the risks that the buyer will abuse them and devalue them.

Meanwhile a potential leaser will weigh up the pros and cons of buying versus leasing, and the lack of top quality domains will see them determine that they would probably be better off just spending a few hundred quid on purchasing a mediocre domain outright, when they see that you could probably find a decent domain for that in a depressed market if you make enough lowball offers until somebody who has had a slow month bites.

pugdomains · Apr 3, 2015

Why is the word L I Q U I D I T Y censored? How bizarre!

Systreg · Apr 3, 2015

It appears that Admin has blocked variations of q u i d d i, because Monkey slated them for not paying him the aff earning he was owed by them

pugdomains · Apr 3, 2015

I think domainers would be more tempted to list domains if there was also a buy it now price on the listings. So...... a domain could be leased for £10 per month minimum term of 12 months, or purchased outright for £300. The buy out clause would be the same as the initial buy it now price (£300). That way, there is an incentive for the buyer to purchase instead of lease, in terms of value for money in the medium term.

So effectively Sedo with a lease option?

bonusmedia · Apr 3, 2015

pugdomains said:
Can't blame the bloke for making sure the demand exists prior to building it though, seen tonnes of people throw cash at projects without testing the waters.

Fair point but he's been offering leases for 4 years now, he should have an idea of demand.

I've leased a couple of names for projects before but reckon it's only worthwhile for super premium stuff with a sale value of at least mid-high 4 figures.

Leasing will be attractive to spammers because they can churn and burn cheaply. It's ok saying you can change nameservers - that won't help much if the person does any blackhat stuff, or even naively works with a cheap 'SEO' company that buys a load of links etc.

LetDomains · Apr 3, 2015

pugdomains said:
I think domainers would be more tempted to list domains if there was also a buy it now price on the listings. So...... a domain could be leased for £10 per month minimum term of 12 months, or purchased outright for £300. The buy out clause would be the same as the initial buy it now price (£300). That way, there is an incentive for the buyer to purchase instead of lease, in terms of value for money in the medium term.

So effectively Sedo with a lease option?

Just to clarify. When somebody signs up to lease a domain they're obliged to state what the domain will be used for. If they then stray from this they've breached the contract and will forfeit the deposit. The real strength of leasing with the option to buy is that I feel companies that lack the li*****ty to buy a domain outright and or wish to test the marketplace but secure a prearranged price for a domain can do so.

Nobody wants to lease a domain on a project that explodes then get strong armed into paying far above the odds for a domain they've added all the value to.

I think if we can have a zero tolerance policy on spam or abuse of any sort this could be a mutually beneficial relationship for both parties. I know numerous tech startups that would love to have access to high value domains but don't have the capital.

LetDomains · Apr 3, 2015

We will include the BIN price, lease price and possibly as additional interesting twist equity + cash lease.

Not sure on the legalities of this but perhaps domain owners can actually actively invest in companies without spending a penny.

I'd love to have invested in a couple of early stage startups purely by way of leasing a domain to them. At the end of the day I'd come out with the money from the lease, the investment and potentially the sale of the domain. Pretty much ZERO risk.

bonusmedia · Apr 3, 2015

Can you give some examples of domains that will be up for lease?

I really don't think it can be zero risk, even if the user doesn't spam, the value of the domain will be affected.

Say someone leases clever.co.uk and runs a business from it which goes under and they give it back in 2 years. Even if they have done nothing wrong, the brand now has negative associations and a load of backlinks to an irrelevant business.

The domain is still in your name, so it only takes one bad apple to ruin your reputation with Google, which is not something anyone can afford.

As for equity, I'm a bit skeptical as to how popular this would be. Personally I wouldn't want equity unless it was a business I'd be willing to put cash into.
Everyone would love to have invested early in a successful startup. The successes are few and far between

Happy to be proven wrong, sorry if this seems a bit negative but they're honest concerns

Like I say I have leased domains before - If you have anything really premium and relevant maybe I will be a customer

LetDomains · Apr 3, 2015

Not negative at all. Realism if anything. I appreciate there's a lot of obstacles I need to overcome.

Let me try and answer your questions:

Mainly .co.uk domains currently. We have domains like laws.co.uk, states.co.uk, vaticancity.co.uk.

Zero risk was perhaps an exaggeration as with any business there's always an element of risk.

Let's take your example:

Let's say for the sake of argument it's worth £5,000. If you lease the domain out at £150 a month. Even if the ship sinks you'll have almost recouped a nice chunk of your initial BIN price over two years purely by leasing. Sure the domain will need some time to heal after that but in time it will. You still have the core asset.

Exactly! Think of it like Crowdcube for domains. You don't need to agree to equity cash split if you're not comfortable with it but if it's a business idea you do like the sound of then why not?

Entrepreneurs tend to associate a lot of value to brand name or domain. You could probably secure far more in equity than the cash equivalent value of your domain and you'd still have that lease revenue stream. As I said I'm brainstorming more than anything but I feel as an option some people would jump at the chance.

Yes I agree startups fail. The ratio is heavily skewed in that direction. You'd essentially be making an informed business decision whether you believe the potential return outweighs the risk. It's that occasional idea that comes and really catches you. I'm not as keen on putting in £25000 for 0.75% and risk losing it regardless of SEIS, EIS etc but if the deal was I'd earn some money and receive similar equity for leasing a domain. Different proposition entirely.

pugdomains · Apr 3, 2015

LetDomains said:
Just to clarify. When somebody signs up to lease a domain they're obliged to state what the domain will be used for. If they then stray from this they've breached the contract and will forfeit the deposit. The real strength of leasing with the option to buy is that I feel companies that lack the li*****ty to buy a domain outright and or wish to test the marketplace but secure a prearranged price for a domain can do so.

Nobody wants to lease a domain on a project that explodes then get strong armed into paying far above the odds for a domain they've added all the value to.

I think if we can have a zero tolerance policy on spam or abuse of any sort this could be a mutually beneficial relationship for both parties. I know numerous tech startups that would love to have access to high value domains but don't have the capital.

You've just quoted my post to write this, but I'm struggling to see how your response is the slightest bit relevant to what I said about having a buy it now price?