The other day I read in the news that Russell Street in Hong Kong has become the most expensive retail location in the world. This sought-after location reminds me of the golden rule in property investment: location, location, location. Buy at addresses where there is a lot of demand for properties. This happens in the physical world.
Surprisingly, the same rule applies to domain investment in the digital world. Since domains are actually digital addresses, you want to buy addresses where there is a lot of demand. So, where do you find the most expensive domains? Namebio. It is the largest database in the world tracking domain sales everyday.
Let’s look at the 100 most expensive domains sold in the past 12 months. Just a glimpse and you’ll see that .com domains are the winner with 82% market share. In fact, the top 10 are all .com domains, as follows:
- Voice.com ($30m)
- California.com ($3m)
- Zoom.com ($2m)
- DXL.com ($1.2m)
- RX.com ($1m)
- Nursing.com ($950k)
- OL.com ($900k)
- Links.com ($797k)
- Files.com ($750k)
- MK.com ($700k)
Examples of other extensions found in this list are:
- Legacy extensions: .org (such as Q.org for $500k) and .net (Horseracing.net for $60k)
- Country extensions: .de (Germany, such as Bad.de for $138k) and .au (Australia, such as Money.com.au for $280k)
- Niche extensions: .games (Free.games for $335k) and .club (Business.club for $61k)
So, what can we learn from this list? First of all, the .com extension is where the most demand for domains can be found, and there is a good reason. This is an extension where there is large, global demand for domains from end users, in addition to speculative demand from domain investors. Another feature is “short is good”. Look at the top 10 domains sold, all of them are 10 characters or less, excluding the extension. Also, they are English-based dictionary words or acronyms.
In short, the best location in domain investment is short .com domains.
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