Have Numeric Domain Values Peaked?

 

Just before the summer, I wrote an article about the increase in demand for (and value of) numeric domain names. It seemed that just about every domain aftermarket and broker newsletter had 3 and 4 number .com domain names for sale at prices that continued to increase week in and week out for quite some time.

I just saw the above embedded tweet from Ryan Colby, a seasoned domain broker and founder of Outcome Brokerage. It seems that Ryan may have observed that the numeric domain name aftermarket has hit its peak and may be in a decline (possibly short term). As a domain broker, he would likely be in a good position to observe this, as he is in contact with buyers and sellers all day.

I personally do not own any numeric domain names and haven’t been looking to buy any. I have seen auctions and sales posts for them, and it seems the prices continue to rise. Perhaps more are coming on the market as a result of domain owners wishing to cash out a high prices?

Whatever the case is, it is interesting that Ryan has made this observation. I am interested in knowing what you think about the market for numeric domain names right now. Has it hit a peak? Is it “resting?” Is Ryan wrong?

What are your thoughts?

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

22 COMMENTS

  1. Brokers have a very short outlook not long.
    Also, they tend to be looking to make deals happen. If anything it works in his favor to say the space has peaked.

    Lastly, in such a small space as ours, one larger buyer in the numeric space taking a vacation can trigger thoughts of a slow down

  2. A good way to drum up some sales inventory, own a few, constant offers coming in from China, have are hard to decipher, but there is a large demand, for a slowly dwindling marketplace of supply.

  3. If they have hit a ‘peak’ as he says that means he’s already started to see a decline, otherwise you can’t call a peak. All the NNNN.com on GoDaddy and Namejet are very strong and higher then I’ve seen before all else equal.

  4. As a NNNN.com lover and investor I can tell you they most likely have not peaked. Every day more are being taken off the market and put into development. China is the driver and the Chinese are still flush with cash. Just my opinion but I have been right on NNNN.com for a number of years

  5. He has fallen into the old trap of “I can’t believe how high these prices have gotten, it has to be a peak”. Did he not see the prices of the NNNN.coms that JUST sold on Namejet in the last 3 days? Record highs. How can a market fall in a day? Ryan is a professional broker and probably does know the overall high end market much better than me but I think he’s wrong here. Only one way to tell and that’s to come back to it in a year. Time will tell

  6. That market is driven by 90% by Chinese interests. I don’t even begin to understand that culture (which is one weird motherfucking culture), I don’t speculate on things I don’t understand. Congrats to those who do understand Chinese culture. Also congrats to those who don’t understand Chinese culture but speculated anyway and have profited.

    This reminds me of the late 1990’s when plumbers and teachers were all experts on tech companies. Some wound up with early retirement and second homes. Others wound up with lessons learned and hindsight.

  7. NNN or NNNN.com is versatile and easier to remember than alphabet words. Numbers are universal whereas words have geographic limitations. The value of numeric domains will continue to rise as long as the internet exists. Sky is the limit for their value.

  8. If Chinese start viewing domains as a real investable asset, all inventory of all the best numeric and non-numeric domains will be taken out in one quick swoop. There is so little of investment-quality inventory, less than a $ billion will probably take everything out. If that does happen, we will see some really crazy price increases.

  9. I personally have no ties to the NNN or NNNN market and I am currently based in Singapore. We have all seen some record sales like 114.com for $2.1m which is great. We also know that the chinese are very flush with money and will be for many years. My only personal issue is relying solely on the chinese market to invest in them. To me it seems like putting all your eggs in one basket. On the flip side the asian market loves them. So my conclusion is they will increase for the next few years but we cant predict the future 😀

  10. I own 2564.com which I got because it spells BLOG in numbers from a phone keypad.

    Have always asked $2564 for the domain… may be a good karma thing.

    Plenty of inquiries from China but no buyers.

    I guess I need the market to peak a little more before a buyer meets my price 🙂

  11. Great thread going here! Since I primarily represent the demand side (buyers) vs. the supply side (sellers), my comment reflects this particular viewpoint. When you are close to the demand side like I am, you begin to observe certain buying patterns.

    Traditional investment wisdom holds that you must buy low and sell high AND that everything is cyclical in nature. While the possibility exists to buy high and sell higher, the big money typically does just the opposite. If we compare this conversation to the stock market, it’s much like “value” investing vs. “momentum” investing. While both techniques can make you money, value investing is the game of choice for those who are risk adverse.

    What I’m observing now is that the liquidity of numerics are drying up a bit. Since prices are peaking, large domain investors may decide to begin moving assets into better priced alternatives. As a broker, yes I tend to take a short term view but that’s exactly what my clients expect of me. We need to be on the pulse of what’s going on NOW in order to make the best of the available opportunities at hand.

    If one studies the entire history of the world you’ll realize that nothing keeps going up forever. There is always a cyclical pattern to things, and this is especially true as it relates to investing. To summarize, I believe that numeric domains are valuable assets, but there IS a point when price may exceed demand and when that happens markets begin to move. Remember that just because there is a fixed supply doesn’t mean prices will rise automatically. If I have a client looking to invest $500,000 per month into domains, I’m always going to fall on the “value” side of the coin. 🙂

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