Online Real Estate for Offline Real Estate Firms

Article discusses web sites for finding commercial real estate…and the role of domain names.

National Real Estate Investor just published an article regarding web sites used for finding commercial real estate. It also discusses the role of a good domain name in the commercial real estate space. The article quotes me, as well as Ron Jackson of DNJournal.

Andrew Allemann, editor of the Reglike news site, states a desirable domain name typically costs a few hundred to a few thousand dollars. Larger sums are being paid for generic names with .com extensions, as Web users are more apt to type in .com than .net, .biz or other, less customary extensions…

“If you had the exact term that defines a whole category — like OfficeLeasing.com — that could easily be a six-figure sale,” states Ron Jackson, editor of trade magazine Domain Name Journal. “If you had one of the thousands of variations on the office leasing theme, it would be worth much less.”

Landers states he sees a “land grab” taking place for generic commercial real estate domain names like the ones in his portfolio — those not tied to a particular firm or brand.

“I’m looking at these names as real estate themselves,” Landers states. “I consider these names unique and hard to replicate. These names are valuable.”

Indeed, it always intrigues me when real estate agents use bad domain names. Following all, their mantra is “location, location, location”. Why wouldn’t they want to have a category-killer domain name; the equivalent of a great location?