In one of the more extraordinary domain name sales, answers.travel has reportedly sold for US$3.3 million in 2008, with the deal closing in the third quarter of the year. Assuming the reports are correct, the sale would make it the second highest reported sale in 2008 behind fund.com, which sold for $9,999,950.
Other previous bigger sales include porn.com ($9.5m - 2007) and diamond.com ($7.5m - 2006)

Answers.travel claims to have a network of over 20,000 travel help desks, concierge services, tour guides, and travel information desks in every major and smaller travel destination across the world. If they don’t have the question on file, they route it to the appropriate specialist in the destination city/country and have the answer emailed directly to the user within 1 to 3 business days. This site is a dream for all travelers. Questions as simple as “Can I travel to Mexico from Canada with a Felony on my record” to “At what times can I see blue dolphins in the island of San Marquez”, anything at all travel related is answered by www.Answers.travel.

The site also offers comparison travel where you can search all of the major travel sites on one screen with a click.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FORECLOSURE.COM OWNER TO ACQUIRE PROPERTY.COM

Brad Geisen continues to build online real estate empire to expand opportunities for future homebuyers and investors nationwide

Boca Raton, Fla. — July 22, 2008

Foreclosure.com Founder, President and CEO, Brad Geisen, announced today that he has reached an agreement with “Domain King” Rick Schwartz to acquire the domain name “Property.com,” paving the way for his entry into a new market.
With Property.com Geisen intends to create a one-of-a-kind — and convenient — one-stop online real estate marketplace that is easy-to-use and navigate. The Web site will serve as an easy-accessible national real estate classified that is going to be free to all visitors, providing sellers, buyers and investors with a whole new concept of marketing and finding homes on the Web.
According to Geisen, the acquisition of Property.com will allow him to focus his efforts on a different and potentially much larger segment of the real estate market. In fact, in Geisen’s opinion, the niche foreclosure market, which is Foreclosure.com’s market, represents just 2 percent of all available real estate inventory.
“I’m going after the 98 percent of the real estate market outside of the foreclosure business.” said Geisen. “For the past several years, I’ve built and run one of, if not ‘the,’ most successful Internet foreclosure businesses, but the business was always exclusively distressed real estate. I’ve achieved in Foreclosure.com what I set out to accomplish and I am ready for a new challenge in a different market. I intend to shift my focus on developing my new ideas that will revolutionize how homes should be listed, viewed and purchased. I’ve developed the critical skills which I intend to apply to this new market,” said Geisen.

Property.com will include all listing types, including those indexed the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), creating a database that could surpass more than 15 million homes, but not including distressed properties, which will remain the business of Foreclosure.com. The best part is that it will be totally free to search for potential buyers and visitors, and sellers will be able to upload and edit their own personal listings at no charge.

It’s a wide-open model that Geisen knows will create an invaluable resource for just about anyone interested in real estate.

“I’m raising the stakes and pushing all my chips to the center of the table,” said Geisen. “Foreclosure.com and my related companies have been leaders in their spaces for nearly a decade. I’ve seen what’s been wrong with the way things were done and I’ve developed the methods to fix them. I have the knowledge and resources to take this to a whole new level … and that’s what I plan to do.”

Geisen revealed the new Property.com will be unveiled sometime in 2009. The specific terms of the deal to acquire Property.com were not disclosed. However, Geisen indicated that the value of the deal is one of the largest URL purchases to date.

That’s a deal that has the seller Rick Schwartz – who is known as the “Domain King” — smiling from ear-to-ear. He purchased Property.com for $750,000 in 2005 and was recently introduced to Geisen through Kevin Leto of BigTicketDomains.com about a possible re-sale.
“My job is to acquire prime, industry specific domain names with large volumes of natural type in traffic and eventually develop them to their fullest potential by partnering with leading companies in their respective fields which I have been doing for more than a decade,” said Schwartz,” “Early on I saw the value in Property.com; however, I never had the resources to develop it so it could reach its maximum potential. Brad Geisen has the vision to truly get the most of Property.com for the benefit of so many people in every corner of the United States. I’m thrilled to be a part of this exciting new project with Brad.”
Stay tuned for frequent updates and milestones for the new Property.com. Feel free to visit the Web site in its current form. However, as mentioned earlier, the complete re-launch will not be official until sometime in 2009.

About Brad Geisen and Foreclosure.com
Ten years ago, Brad Geisen founded Foreclosure.com and built it over time to a company with more than 1.8 million foreclosure, preforeclosure, bankruptcy, FSBO and tax lien listings in one place, Foreclosure.com delivers America’s largest and most accurate searchable database of foreclosed homes and distressed property information to its customers and business partners. Based in Boca Raton, Florida, Brad Geisen and Foreclosure.com work with hundreds of top lending institutions and government agencies to list diverse property types on its Web site, including Real Estate Owned (REO); Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD); Department of Veterans Affairs (VA); Fannie Mae; and other government agency and financial institution properties; as well as listings from an extensive network of corporate sellers. On the Web: www.foreclosure.com.
About eRealEsate.com.

Rick Schwartz, aka “Domain King” and “Webfather,” is the CEO, President and Cofounder of T.R.A.F.F.I.C. found at TargetedTraffic.com– the premiere domain conference for the domain industry. It is both the oldest and largest and attracts over 500 of the top professionals in the industry in a by invitation only event. As one of the early domain pioneers dating back to 1995, Rick has a knack for predicting big trends and getting it right. He may have been the first to recognize the value of “type in” traffic which is now commonly referred to as “direct navigation” — the most potent and targeted traffic on the net. Rick has a prime portfolio of one and two word domains, and is considered by many to be among the leading experts on domain names, traffic, Web site flow and valuation. www.eRealestate.com

Media Contact
Thomas Myers
Foreclosure.com
tmyers@foreclosure.com

The Sedo auction for pizza.com has finished with the domain name selling for a hot and spicy US$2.6 million. The domain was originally registered 14 years ago by Charles Clark from North Potomac in Maryland, the United States.

“It’s crazy, it’s just crazy,” Clark, who recently launched a software company, told The Baltimore Sun. “That amount of money is significant. It will make a significant difference in my life, for sure.”

Clark originally registered the domain name when trying to snare a contract with a pizza company for his internet consulting firm. The contract never happened but he kept up the registration of the domain.

Clark had not developed the site for some time, having monetised the site for some of the time and last year turning it into a profitable pizza directory as well as selling advertising earning around $5,000 per year, the costs of maintaining the site.

Then Clark and his co-developer heard of the sale of vodka.com for $3 million so they thought maybe there would be some interest in their pizza.com. So they posted a notice on their site in January saying the domain name was for sale and received several six-figure offers.

Then Clark approached Sedo and the domain name went up for auction. Clark and his family then went on holiday in Disneyland with his kids glued to their computer, constantly updating their father on the progress.

And does Clark have one regret. Yes, that he did not buy more domain names he told the Baltimore Sun.

“In ‘94, you could have just registered everything and anything,” Clark said. “I think about that now, yeah.”

Don’t we all have that regret!

Pompano Beach, Fla. – Moniker (http://www.moniker.com/), an Oversee.net company and the leading provider of Domain Asset Management™ services, today announced that it has successfully brokered the sale of Bored.com for US $4 million and an associated portfolio of 170 websites for US $500,000. Bored.com was established in 1997 and today provides more than two million visitors a month with solutions to the age-old question of what to do when you are bored. The site serves as a portal linking to leading sites in music, humor, gaming, quizzes & trivia, and more.

The sales agreement includes several assets associated with continuing the current business model. The site will remain operational under its new owner, JW Media. Other online properties currently being developed by JW Media include BuyShoes.com and Campout.com. A spokesman for JW Media said “We’ve been waiting a long time for an Internet property to challenge our creativity. Although there is a great deal of competition out there with gaming, video, and entertainment sites, it is our belief that Bored.com and Bored.tv will be a household name by 2009.” Through their purchase of Bored.com, JW Media will create a unique brand and site which they say will rival the top entertainment sites on the web. “We were raised on the Internet. This is not just a business endeavor for our company, but also a passion. We will have a great time meeting our demographics’ needs.”

According to figures available on Alexa.com, Bored.com has experienced steady growth in traffic and page rank over the last three months, making it an ideal target for advertisers looking to reach a diverse audience. “Bored.com is a premier generic domain that has been developed into a site that will attract both search and direct navigation visitors,” said Monte Cahn, co-founder and CEO of Moniker.com. “With thousands of sites linking into Bored.com it has mass appeal to advertisers looking to reach an audience who is seeking entertainment online.”

About Moniker

Moniker, an Oversee.net company, is the leading provider of Domain Asset Management™ services and a complete set of business services that provide companies a single-point-of-access to help manage and maximize the value of their domains. These services include name creation, registration, acquisition, portfolio management, appraisal and escrow services, traffic monetization and after-market sales – all backed by unsurpassed customer service and security. With more than a decade of experience, Moniker is a top 10 domain registrar, holds the industry’s highest customer retention rate and pioneered the industry’s first domain appraisal formula. It is considered the industry’s premier marketplace to buy and sell domain names.

Source: Moniker.com Press

Shopping.de sold for €1.5million on Sedo according to a report in OnlinePC.ch. The seller, Andreas Malek, bought the domain name five years ago, along with a number of others including einkaufen.de (the German word for “shopping”).

Some of the best domains available for the Internet Dating and Social Networking industries will be available for bidding in a Live Domain Auction presented by Moniker. The auction will take place at 2:30 p.m. PST/5:30 p.m. EST on Friday, February 1st, at the iDate 2008 and Social Networking Conference being held in Miami Beach.

Top inventory includes:

AsianBachelors.com
CampingDates.com
ChristianSinglesOnline.com
DatingClassifieds.com
eRomance.com
FloridaPersonals.com
FtWorthSingles.com
Fun.sc
FunDate.mobi/FunDates.mobi
GirlBlog.net
GoodGossip.com
Honey.net
HotLocalSingles.com
InternetDating.us
Introduction.com
IWantU.com (portfolio & assets)
LatinBachelors.com
LoveMatchDate.com
MalibuSingles.com
MenGoneWild.com
MiamBeachDating.com
MiamiSocialNetworking.com
Neighborhood.com
OrlandoSingles.com
Personals.net
ProgressiveDating.com
SinglesHotel.com
TGP.com
WeddingVows.com

How to bid in this auction:

Bidding in this live event is available through:

• Absentee Bidding – Submit a form with the lots you’re interested in and your maximum bid for each. The auctioneer bids on your behalf
• Telephone Bidding – A proxy bidder will call you when the lot you’re interested in comes up for bidding. You determine if you want to bid, and the amount of your bid, live on the telephone.

These bidding options are available for $299. While this fee cannot be refunded, the full amount will apply toward any purchase you make.  Find out more by contacting sales@moniker.com or visit the Moniker website for Absentee and Telephone bidding details.

Listen Live on WebmasterRadio

The Live Auction will also be broadcasted live on Webmaster Radio.FM. Tune in by visiting http://www.webmasterradio.fm. WebmasterRadio is the premier free online radio network focused on the B2B marketplace. During the auction, listeners will be able to join the chat room and connect with peers in real time.

In an email sent out to customers today, NameJet announced lower initial bid prices, improvements and new features to their expiring domain name sales site. NameJet had received some early negative reviews for releasing a seemingly rushed version of the site and some unusual bugs and complaints are still being reported from time to time on forums. Many of the yet-to-be-added features such as displaying bidder IDs will be a welcome change to many who bid in the expiring domain after-market and build up trust in the marketplace.

Here is the email:

We appreciate your business and have listened to your comments and suggestions. Based on your feedback, we’ve recently made a number of enhancements to our Web site and bidding processes to make it even faster and easier for you to find, manage and bid on domain names.We’ve lowered the minimum bid price on all our domains! Minimum bid pricing will now start as low as $29 on some domains. Our Pre-Release, Pending Delete and Public Auction domains will have variable starting prices. Please note, if you already have a bid on a domain at our previous minimum bid amount of $70, NameJet will automatically adjust your bid to the new minimum bid amount.

Plus, bidding increments are now even more flexible. Instead of only having the option of bidding in increment amounts–$10 for auctions less than $1,000 or $100 for auctions greater than $1,000–you can now bid any amount over the $10 or $100 minimum bid needed. If you want to place a bid of $11, $12 or any whole dollar over the minimum bid increment, you now have the option to do so.

Visit our FAQs to learn more about the change in the bidding process: http://www.namejet.com/Pages/FAQ.aspx#bidding

In addition to the bid changes, we’ve recently made the following changes to assist you in getting the domain name you want:

* Advanced Search Improvements: Quickly drill down to the names you want — by extension, backorder date, number of characters, bid amount, and, of course, keywords.
* Faster Bulk Bidding: Bulk bid on up to 250 domain names at once in our quick and easy to use input format.
* Wish List Enhancement: Manage your backorder wish lists with a click to edit and delete your backorders.
* New Alert Emails: Let our names come to you with emails delivered daily that list our Most Active Backorders, names with 6 characters or less, or those with 7 to 9 characters.

And, more changes are on the way… here’s a sneak peek at what’s coming soon:

* Bidder Alias: You can assign a Bidder Alias to your account. Other bidders will see this alias during the auction rather than a generic name like “Bidder 1”.

* Bid History: Be able to view the history of bids for a specified domain.

* Auction List View: Set your account to either save or automatically remove previous auctions in which you were not the winning bidder.

* My Account Reports: We are upgrading the reports available to you with additional sorting and filtering.

We hope the changes we have made and our upcoming enhancements will assist you in winning auctions on the domain names you want from NameJet.

Please visit us at www.NameJet.com.

Sincerely,

NameJet Customer Support

NASK have released some more information on their upcoming conference. There will be an emphasis on the secondary market in the .pl ccTLD with growth perspectives, possible threats and the potential of the Polish domain name market to be topics discussed by participants at the first conference of kind to be held in Poland. It is the “Domain Names Secondary Market in Poland” and will be held in Warsaw on January 25.The conference is organised by NASK and ACTIVE 24, is aimed at registrars, investors and companies with an innovative approach to the fast growing domain market in Poland. Top executives from international corporations, including NameDrive, SEDO and EuroDNS, and representatives of .eu, .at and .se registries will share their knowledge about the primary and secondary market of domains.

The conference has been divided into three theme sessions. The first session will present the Polish domain market and perspectives of its growth. During the second session, devoted to the security of DNS, the Swedish registration agency NIC.se will present its solutions in the DNSSEC area. The final part of the conference will focus on the discussion of both the opportunities and threats for the Polish domain market and a representative from SEDO will discuss the phenomenon of the domain names secondary market.

The .pl ccTLD is one of the largest in Central and Eastern Europe. According to Andrzej Bartosiewicz, Head of DNS Division at NASK, the number of “.pl” domains is expected to exceed 1 million in the first half of this year. “It is interesting to know that almost seven percent of them are domain names registered only to generate traffic. Their owners – usually individuals – known as ‘domainers’ – earn money in this way”, adds Bartosiewicz.

For more information see the NASK website at nask.pl/nask_en/

Rick Scwhartz has reason to smile
after $750,000 sale of iReport.com

T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Conference co-founder and pioneer domain investor Rick Schwartz has just completed the sale of iReport.com to the Cable News Network for $750,000. As the contract was being finalized Schwartz was asked if he had any similar domains so he told CNN he also owned the hyphenated version, i-Report.com. When the cable TV company expressed interest in getting that domain as well to protect their planned branding of iReport.com, Schwartz said he decided to give them that less desirable name at no charge rather than re-open negotiations and delay closing of the deal for iReport.com.

Full Article