Frequently asked questions


About Us Domain Names Pricing Transactions & Assistance Legal Miscellaneous

About Us


Who are you?
We are a fast-growing discount domain name retailer based in New York and Massachusetts. Learn more about us.

How long have you been around?
We have been offering domain names since 2008. Since then, we have matched over 500 parties with their web identities.

What kinds of customers do you serve?
We provide a broad variety of domain names, spanning nearly every major business sector and area of life. We have sold domains to clothing stories, musicians, physicians, software firms, pharmaceutical companies, hotels, nonprofits, and numerous other types of clients. While our customers range in size from individuals to large enterprises, the majority of our buyers are SMBs seeking new or better web names.

Domain Names


What is a domain name?
Domain names uniquely identify a business or cause on the web and over e-mail. For example, our domain is dandydomains.com, which anyone may type into his/her web browser (optionally prefixed by "www.") to reach our website. A domain name consists of two parts: [1] the keyword (e.g. "dandydomains") and, and [2] the extension (e.g. ".com"). The .com suffix is designed for businesses, .org for nonprofits, and .net for technology-oriented sites or as an alternative when the .com is not available. Most extensions aside from these three are [a] reserved for special institutions (.edu for schools, .gov for government sites), [b] country-specific (.co.uk for UK companies, .de for Germanic ones), or [c] available to the public, but privately sponsored with a special purpose in mind (.name for family sites, .tel for online business cards, etc.).

Most importantly, a domain name flavors how the world thinks of your business or cause and influences search engine placement.

Businesses often purchase multiple domains, each corresponding to a product or service they offer, and build provisional landing pages to capture leads for those products or services through search engine queries. Recently, for example, a mid-sized IT firm purchased BlacklistCheck.com from us and have since consistently appeared on page 1 — around result #3 — on Google searches for "blacklist check", a highly competitive set of keywords which are queried on Googled over 145,000 times annually. The landing page method serves as a supplement to — or even a low-cost replacement for — Internet advertising and branding.

Why buy a premium domain name?
For the same reasons you might purchase shopping space on Fifth Avenue rather than in Mott Haven, New York City. A premium domains enhances professional credibility, generates additional leads, protects your brand, allows you to tap into higher-profile visitor traffic, makes for a high-yield investment, and blocks competitors from accessing these same benefits. Learn more by reading our article, Why Buy a Premium Domain?

If I purchase BallpointPens.com, do I also own ballpointpens.com and www.ballpointpens.com? Can I create @ballpointpens.com e-mail addresses?
Yes, yes, and yes. Domain names are case-insensitive and typing the "www." part is optional. You may create as many e-mail addresses under your domain name as you wish.

I own BallpointPens.net. Can I simply purchase BallpointPens.com and forward it to my existing BallpointPens.net?
Absolutely! This is one of the most common scenarios we encounter. Companies frequently approach us seeking to "upgrade" their existing domain name — from, say, AmazingPizzaNYC.net to AmazingPizza.com, or CoachMeInc.com to CoachMe.com — so they could brand themselves using a more powerful, memorable name on their advertising materials (brochures, cargo trucks, storefronts, etc.) yet don't want to bother building new website from scratch. Buying a new domain and redirecting it to your existing website takes only minutes, and, by using a feature called masking, you can even completely hide that the user is actually viewing the lengthier domain's content.

Pricing


How do you determine pricing?
We explain fully in our article, Valuating Domain Names.

I can buy a domain for $10 through GoDaddy. Why do you charge hundreds or thousands for yours?
That's much like asking "Why should I rent a shopping space for $25,000/month on Fifth Avenue rather than the equivalent space for $1000/month in Mott Haven, New York?" Like brick-and-mortar real estate, or any item that's unique (there's only one cars.com), domain names can — and do — appreciate in value once registered. You can actually register brand new domains for as little as $7.50 with the proper coupon code, but a typical domain listed at DandyDomains.com is 5-15 years old and was purchased from another domain investor for an amount ranging from $100 to $2500.

In 1994, one investor registered wine.com for less than the price of lunch, but that didn't stop eVineyard from purchasing wine.com for $3.3 million in 2001. We are not a registrar like GoDaddy; we are a secondary market domain name brokerage service. Our industry is profoundly competitive, with nearly every sensible combination of 1, 2, and 3-word domains registered and thousands of investors vying for the few that remain. Nevertheless, you will find our value to be far superior to that offered by all such major aftermarkets as BuyDomains and DomainMarket. We welcome you to browse through domain trade journals like DNJournal or domain sale databases like NameBio to gain an intuition for how much domains sell for.

You might also find our discussion on Valuating Domain Names to be a worthwhile read.

Why are certain domains shown with Make Offer rather than a fixed price listing?
As the domain market evolves rapidly, it is impractical to sticker prices on all our domains, only to re-price them several weeks later. If a domain is listed as "Make Offer", we have deemed it particularly susceptible to changing market conditions.

Can I buy one of your domain names for cheaper than what it's listed for?
We offer a 5% discount on all our names to registered members, and we may provide further discounts for bulk or repeat purchases. Please contact us if you wish to learn how we priced a specific domain. Our rates are extremely competitive compared to those of all major domain aftermarkets, and if we have listed a domain on multiple venues to increase exposure, it will always be listed for the cheapest price on DandyDomains.com.

What are my payment options?
For fixed-price and most Make Offer domains, we accept payment via PayPal or credit card directly through DandyDomains.com. For both our protection and yours, we may request — and guide the user through — a secure escrow transaction on higher-priced offers.

Are there any other fees?
You only pay us the exact amount listed on our website (for fixed-price listings) or formally agreed upon (for "Make Offer" listings). Our fee covers at least one year of registration and transfer of ownership.

Following your transaction, you will continue to own the domain so long as you continue renewing it annually with your registrar, as you would with any domain name. Renewal fees range from $7.50 to $35, depending on the registrar.

Buyers who request escrow transactions are responsible for paying escrow fees (typically $25-$100) to the servicing company. In the event we request escrow, i.e. for our own protection, the escrow fees are on us.

Transactions & Assistance


What happens after I pay?
One of our representatives will contact you within one business day to guide you through the transfer of domain ownership. Domain transfers are usually quick but may require up to seven days depending on your registrar. GoDaddy customers may opt for a form of transfer called domain push (or "account change"), a full transfer process which completes in about 5-10 minutes.

DandyDomains.com looks like a relatively new company. How can I guarantee myself a secure transaction?
We have processed over 500 successful domain name transactions and would be happy to put you in touch with any of our numerous satisfied clients as a reference. We are a PayPal-verified merchant, and you can confirm our ownership of any of the domains we list through any public whois service, such as GoDaddy whois. Simply type the domain name you wish to check, hit 'GO', and scroll down to view the domain name ownership information.

Customers may contact us to arrange appointments with us for real-time transactions. During such an appointment, one of our representatives will phone you at a number you designate. We will stay on the line with you as you purchase your desired domain and we immediately work with you to transfer it to your registrar account. This is a free service.

If you would prefer an added measure of security, we would be happy to set up an escrow transaction upon request. Escrow acts as a government-certified third party that takes ownership of payment and domain name, then — only once in possession of both — transfers domain name to buyer and payment to seller. Our preferred escrow services are Escrow.com and Sedo, but we're open to using any BBB-accredited escrow of your choice. While escrow transactions are generally swift (3-5 business days from start to finish) and painless, we do require that buyers pay the escrow service fee of about $25-$100.

As a final alternative, you can purchase most of our fixed-price domains through GoDaddy's premium domain listing service. Simply look up the availability of your desired domain at GoDaddy.com and, so long as the name is listed on our site, GoDaddy will inform you the domain is avaliable as a "Premium Domain Name". Simply add the domain to your cart and check out. While the domain name will land in your account immediately following, please be advised that all our domains listed through GoDaddy are priced approximately 30% higher on GoDaddy than on DandyDomains.com to compensate for GoDaddy's 30% premium domain listing commission. We thus do not generally recommend this purchase method to customers unless they find all previously mentioned options unsatisfactory.

Do you offer refunds on domain purchases?
We do not provide refunds under any circumstances, so please make your purchase decisions with integrity.

Can you guide me step-by-step through the domain transfer, or help me configure my purchased domain name so it redirects to or displays our website content?
Yes on both counts. We provide free transfer/configuration assistance over e-mail, or in real time via phone.

Legal


Do your domains infringe on any trademarks? Can I get sued by a trademark holder following purchase of one of your domains?
We carefully cross-check each domain we acquire with the database of all U.S.-registered trademarks and will never intentionally infringe on any registered third-party IP. There might be rare instances in which we inadvertently list a name that conflicts with an overseas trademark registration; if you believe you are the owner of such a mark, we recommend you contact us with proof of your filing.

A per our terms of use, we are not responsible for legal defense of any domain name once purchased from us. We hold this policy because demonstrating infringement requires both illustrating potential confusion with the mark of the trademark holder and "bad faith use" of the domain name. If you owned the name apple.com, for example, you could legally use the domain to sell apples, but not computers, due to Apple, Inc.'s well-established trademark. We have no control over how you use your domain name following your purchase.

Furthermore, corporations often harass legitimate domain name owners in hope of intimidating the owner into ceding the name due to his/her lack of knowledge about the legal process. This method of bullying, formally called reverse domain hijacking, is strictly illegal, and if you receive a cease and desist letter on a generic domain you purchased, we recommend you consult with a legal expert on domain names such as Ari Goldberger, John Berryhill, or Howard Neu to familiarize yourself with your rights as a domain name owner and obtain legal advice. One famous example of a reverse domain hijacking attempt is the Nissan.com case. More domain law information.

Miscellaneous


Why is your company so passionate about selling domain names?
We are a group of entrepreneurs who share enthusiasm for interdisciplinary collaboration and the power that fusing analytical and creative minds holds to generate immense value while advancing the global marketplace of ideas. Engineers tend to specialize in creating products and services ("tangible value-building"), while educators and advertisers tend to help consumers gather the most benefit from those products and services ("intangible value-building"). Domain names stand at the intersection of tangible and intangible value creation, quantitatively increasing visitor traffic due to the search engine benefits they contribute while helping companies climb the ladder of brand equity by coating their facades with a classier makeover.

Can you list some of your past sales along with prices?
A few of our recent sales include those of Waggish.com, VintageSociety.com, TaxiTruck.com, and VibratingFeeders.com. To view more, browse through our domain listings as we show all domain names we have sold within the past several months. We do not disclose sale prices here as most of our buyers prefer that these amounts remain private.

Someone else owns a domain I want. Can you help acquire it for me?
We occasionally offer this service, called domain buyer brokerage, to prior customers or for higher-value domain names. Please contact us and we will do our best to accommodate you.

I have another question not listed here. How can I contact you?
Please use our contact form. We look forward to assisting you.