Lessoned learned from expired domain

[AdMunchkin]

I forgot to renew my domain because I was so frustrated Shopify shut my store down. It's a long story. I was supposed to renew at the end of June and dumb me thought it was on auto-renewal. I tried to log in to my hosting and it wouldn't allow me so I reached support. They finally got me in and I saw the domain. in my account that expired in 2025. I was so happy. However, they told me it is selling in an auction for $5,100!

I was so depressed and feeling dumb that I never renewed my domain for only $10. Guys, please have it on auto-renewal.

 

[AccKing]

it is what it is...i hope you find another domain soon

 

[AdMunchkin]

it is what it is...i hope you find another domain soon

The old domain that expired had many medium to high comp. keywords ranking on 1st page because it was easier to rank. Do you think I can use those old articles I had written and put them on a new domain since the domain is expired and has nothing on it?

 

[hideath]

The old domain that expired had many medium to high comp. keywords ranking on 1st page because it was easier to rank. Do you think I can use those old articles I had written and put them on a new domain since the domain is expired and has nothing on it?

not a wise choice, especially if the pages still indexed,
google will keep a cached versions of the pages for a few months at least as well,

if the domain is within the auctions it means it's past the redemption period usually,
but it's not always the case, you should contact the registrar asap and ask if you can still renew the domain,

if it's within the grace/redepmtion period, you have the full right to renew the domain and they would cancel the auction,
grace period is typically 45 days and redepmtion is 30 days (can vary for some other TLDs), so that's 75 days after losing control over it,
they could cost you 10-15 more during the redemtion period, but it's much less than the actual price in the auction,

they told you that the domain is within the auction currently, they didn't mention anything about renewal,
make sure to double check the original expiration date and whenever it's still possible to get it back,
if it's the case, make it clear that you want your domain back and you're willing to pay the fee

 

[Megaverse]

I would be surprised if your domain registrar is not GoDaddy.

 

[dabz5]

You had 1 domain and you forgot, what if you had 50? Anyways, lesson learned. However, never deal with godaddy, they are crooks. They bought your domain and want to sell it to you for $5,100. Not that the domain is worth that money.

 

[AdMunchkin]

This is what they wrote :

We understand your concern completely, however, the domain name xxxxx expired on 6/16/2024 and was removed from your account after its grace period.


We see that the domain name is registered by someone else and listed for sale. You can read more about what happens after the expiration of the term of a domain name registration in our Domain Registration Agreement, which you have accepted at the time of your domain purchase.

We can suggest contacting the current domain owners using the information available in public Whois to see if they are willing to sell the domain name. You can search for that information by using online tools or use our Whois tool, available at

As an option, you may contact DomainAgents for help with negotiations with the current owner.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to renew the domain name for a regular price now. We are sorry about it.\

 

[AdMunchkin]

I would be surprised if your domain registrar is not GoDaddy.

It's namecheap

 

[GreenGrass2019]

What were the ahref's stats on your domain? Crazy how it went to 5100USD but then again I've seen domains with ZERO backlinks go for thousands of dollars. Not sure if people are dumb or not lol

 

[Megaverse]

It's namecheap

Okay.
Namecheap is not known to use underhand tactics in business dealings. Have you contacted support?
I have many domains with namecheap over the years with no issues. Usually a live chat can resolve issues.
Try doing a live chat with them, they will explain what you should do.

 

[AdMunchkin]

You had 1 domain and you forgot, what if you had 50? Anyways, lesson learned. However, never deal with godaddy, they are crooks. They bought your domain and want to sell it to you for $5,100. Not that the domain is worth that money.

I bought it from Namecheap. I was surprised they have it on auction for over $5K. Yes, I had a good DA, backlinks, and old age. It was an eCommerce business that went down the drain. We had supplier issues and the domain has negative reviews on BBB, trust pilot, etc.

I just wanted to use it for the backlinks and DA. Then I saw selling for 5K I was like who is going to buy that? Then I thought geez if I can get 5K for it.

 

[hideath]

This is what they wrote :

We understand your concern completely, however, the domain name xxxxx expired on 6/16/2024 and was removed from your account after its grace period.


We see that the domain name is registered by someone else and listed for sale. You can read more about what happens after the expiration of the term of a domain name registration in our Domain Registration Agreement, which you have accepted at the time of your domain purchase.

We can suggest contacting the current domain owners using the information available in public Whois to see if they are willing to sell the domain name. You can search for that information by using online tools or use our Whois tool, available at

As an option, you may contact DomainAgents for help with negotiations with the current owner.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to renew the domain name for a regular price now. We are sorry about it.\

It's namecheap

well, it's gone, it's basically someone' else now,
sorry for the loss, just make sure that you've got the lesson from now on,
secure yourself, your assets & everything that you could do something about it,
it's just a domain name after all, some people learnt the lesson the harder way, some didn't make it to actually learn the lesson,
security is one of the few things that people tend to avoid investing in, whenever it's time, work or money

 

[The_Raven]

Seems you lazy at reading your email notifications.

 

[hideath]

What were the ahref's stats on your domain? Crazy how it went to 5100USD but then again I've seen domains with ZERO backlinks go for thousands of dollars. Not sure if people are dumb or not lol

the more strange that's a namecheap auction, i don't even check their auctions anymore,
i do even filter them out using spamzilla because most of them are trash/spammed,
you'll get good deals usually with sedo & namejet auctions, probably 20%-30% of what you pay if they were in godaddy, even less in some cases,

it's usually the godady ones, i'm typically ready to pay %110-%200 of the actual domain link profile worth in godaddy (estimated ofc),
because #1, i'll be saving the time creating a similar link profile and that surely worth and #2 they got their hands in majority of the useful domains

 

[AdMunchkin]

What were the ahref's stats on your domain? Crazy how it went to 5100USD but then again I've seen domains with ZERO backlinks go for thousands of dollars. Not sure if people are dumb or not lol

I don't have access to ahrefs. However I don't know how accurate is Moz. The DA is 55,415 Linking domains and a spam score of 58%. I don't remember the spam score being so high when I owned it. Weird.

 

[GreenGrass2019]

I don't have access to ahrefs. However I don't know how accurate is Moz. The DA is 55,415 Linking domains and a spam score of 58%. I don't remember the spam score being so high when I owned it. Weird.

Try here https://ahrefs.com/backlink-checker/

 

[AdMunchkin]

Okay.
Namecheap is not known to use underhand tactics in business dealings. Have you contacted support?
I have many domains with namecheap over the years with no issues. Usually a live chat can resolve issues.
Try doing a live chat with them, they will explain what you should do.

I was on chat with them for almost 2 hours last night because I couldn't get into my account. Then I saw my domain still in there but it said "The domain is at another Namecheap account." I asked to explain it and they said it's in auction and unfortunately you can't get it back because I didn't renew in June. They said I can buy it back for $5100. They gave me all these policies blah blah

 

[cartwrightyoshiko9]

I forgot to renew my domain because I was so frustrated Shopify shut my store down. It's a long story. I was supposed to renew at the end of June and dumb me thought it was on auto-renewal. I tried to log in to my hosting and it wouldn't allow me so I reached support. They finally got me in and I saw the domain. in my account that expired in 2025. I was so happy. However, they told me it is selling in an auction for $5,100!

I was so depressed and feeling dumb that I never renewed my domain for only $10. Guys, please have it on auto-renewal.

Thank you for sharing your experience. This would help a lot of people here

 

[AdMunchkin]

Try here https://ahrefs.com/backlink-checker/

Thanks, Man! Here are the stats. What a joke. I'm know SEO expert but this looks hideous for 5100

 

[AdMunchkin]

Thank you for sharing your experience. This would help a lot of people here

Yeah, I'm here to help. I'm more of a PPC guy. However, I ran out of funds for a 9-year-old business and borrowed too much capital, and for the last couple of years, I wasn't profiting. Now I will have to face the music and file for bankruptcy. This was my full-time job.

Lessoned learned: Don't borrow too much capital, don't put too many eggs in one basket ... Diversify, Get back up after a setback. When I was losing everything I turned my life into drinking and ended up being depressed.

I have a family, kids, a nice home, and nice cars, and I realized that it is nothing without your health. I have to get back on track with pretty much zero. You can lose things so quickly. I was blinded to the truth.