Beware of broker tactic (1 Viewing)

  • Topic Starter rlm
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rlm

rlm

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So - here's the situation.

A guy who is trying to broker domains calls me by looking up my home phone # in the whitepages. I've gotten lowball offers from him many times in the past and it has never gone anywhere, so I tend to ignore them. He called me about a domain a couple weeks ago, acting as if he was in touch with a business owner and wanting a price. Then a couple days later I get lowball $1000 offers on two completely different generic 1-word dictionary ultra premium domains - from this same guy, using two different email addresses. Both of these domains have public whois so with a couple seconds of work he should have known it was me and not fire off random lowballs. So I tell him I ignore lowball offers, why are you sending me these?

This is his response:

Why I sent you offers
I may track 30 domains down in a day. As you know, whois is not a great place to find contacts. That means I do not know I am sending them to you. It also means I have no idea what domains I asked about, I'd rather search 30 today, than 15 because I was keeping track. If you kept the emails just reply if you want to sell them.

My business model recently is to find great .ca domains that would be of interest to a fashion house. I tracked down NeimanMarcus.ca's owner by contacting a friend at Bodis. The owner contacted me, now I will reach out to Neiman Marcus with, "I am a Canadian domain investor, I don't own NeimanMarcus.ca but I may be able to find the Canadian owner and negotiate the purchase for you".

Why would the domain owner pay me a commission when he could sell it himself? 1. He doesn't have the time and a subordinate does not understand the domain world. 2. A third party, me, keeps the emotions down. As you know a CEO can be pissed that someone bought 'his' Canadian domain 3. That same CEO could accuse the owner of 'bad faith' if the owner reached out and offered to sell it. He may launch a legal procedure, particularly if the domain is not an English word.5. I am good at it.
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I'm horrified by this. Am I over reacting? What do you guys think? @MapleDots @DomainRecap @MaiTaiMan or anyone else wanting to chime in?
 
My business model recently is to find great .ca domains that would be of interest to a fashion house. I tracked down NeimanMarcus.ca's owner by contacting a friend at Bodis. The owner contacted me, now I will reach out to Neiman Marcus with, "I am a Canadian domain investor, I don't own NeimanMarcus.ca but I may be able to find the Canadian owner and negotiate the purchase for you".
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So much is wrong with that statement :eek:

The problem here is he may spoil a legitimate domain sale. I would be pretty peeved if someone was actively soliciting my domains without my knowledge. I can contact the obvious end users myself but I prefer to keep a clean slate and wait for them to initiate contact.

Is it just me or is a domain broker not supposed to be hired by one of the two parties before he begins his work?

What do you call someone that does deals behind the lines and potentially interferes with a legitimate business without being authorized to do so?
 
One of the many reasons I insist on "principals only", to avoid all this BS. Non-negotiable and no exceptions.
 
Link in post modified, learn more at:  NamePoos.com
My business model recently is to find great .ca domains that would be of interest to a fashion house. I tracked down NeimanMarcus.ca's owner by contacting a friend at Bodis.
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I would just like to clarify here, the "friend at Bodis", which was a colleague of mine, did NOT give out the domain owner's details when contacted by this broker. We would never do that. My colleague merely forwarded on the message.

Shaun
 
GeorgeK said:
Looks like all links to Name Pros aren't being changed to "name Poos", hmmmm. Anyhow, one can change it back manually.
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Of course I meant "ARE being changed" above. (too late to edit original post)
 
GeorgeK said:
Of course I meant "ARE being changed" above. (too late to edit original post)
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Unlike namepoos who changes the entire link for ANY forum to rule_violation we do allow the link and are simply drawing attention to the tactic.

Copy the link to the browser and change 1 letter poos to pros and the link will work.

I might rethink that depending on feedback but if you read namepoos.com I am trying to get all domain forums together and working with each other instead of against.

So the change is simply symbolic and not meant to prohibit anyone from posting a link.


Screenshot (55).png
 
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rlm said:
I'm horrified by this. Am I over reacting? What do you guys think? @MapleDots @DomainRecap @MaiTaiMan or anyone else wanting to chime in?
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Just like nitwits pulling this front-running TM scam on .COM, this is going to result in a LOT of CDRPs being filed as companies will view it as a prime opportunity to pick up ultra-valuable premium words (like the scammer offered you $1K on) for pennies on the dollar.

And like in the US, all you need to do is find a willing panelist who will believe that "there is no possible way the domain owner isn't linked to the broker" and they'll steal your domains.
 
So full disclosure, I posted this here because he is a member here, but I won't call him out. But I did want him to see that I'm sure I'm not the only one that doesn't like this idea.

I told him, feel free to contact companies and offer your services, but do not mention my domains, and do not contact me until you've been engaged by that company to work on their behalf. I said you have to represent the buyer, not me. I'm not wasting my time responding to these fishing expeditions.
 
BODIS said:
I would just like to clarify here, the "friend at Bodis", which was a colleague of mine, did NOT give out the domain owner's details when contacted by this broker. We would never do that. My colleague merely forwarded on the message.

Shaun
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Yes, thank you. I trust the Bodis wouldn't do anything like that, simply forwarding the message is the right thing to do.
 
rlm said:
I'm horrified by this. Am I over reacting? What do you guys think? @MapleDots @DomainRecap @MaiTaiMan or anyone else wanting to chime in?
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I included @MaiTaiMan because as an established broker, I wanted to see what he had to say about this tactic. He is NOT the person doing this. I just didn't want anyone trying to connect the dots and presume it may have been him.
 
rlm said:
So full disclosure, I posted this here because he is a member here, but I won't call him out. But I did want him to see that I'm sure I'm not the only one that doesn't like this idea.
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You're talking about me, right?

To add context, I made a post back in January of 2022 asking users to contact me if they owned any first name .CA domains. I explained by email how our sales process worked, you expressed discomfort and I ended the conversation.

This was during the pandemic real estate boom when everyone and their dog could broker a deal. My company was building over a dozen websites a week for agents and I'd upsell first and last name domains. Quite different from what this "broker" is doing, don't you think?
 
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GeorgeK said:
Long thread on namepoos, see:

https://www.namepoos.com/threads/domain-front-running-by-lumis-com.1283492/

Some of the links to Twitter embeds in that thread aren't working.....one can search Twitter, though:

https://twitter.com/search?q=@georgekirikos lumis&src=typed_query&f=live

Looks like all links to Name Pros aren't being changed to "name Poos", hmmmm. Anyhow, one can change it back manually.
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You can see some of my comments in that thread.

I have a massive issue with this "tactic" that some brokers are using.

It puts all the risk on the domain owner.

Brad
 
MapleDots said:
Is it just me or is a domain broker not supposed to be hired by one of the two parties before he begins his work?
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Exactly. So don't contact me asking for a price on a domain you don't intend to buy, nor when you are not an authorized rep for a real buyer. I'm starting to think I may have to go with the "principals only" principle.
 
rlm said:
Exactly. So don't contact me asking for a price on a domain you don't intend to buy, nor when you are not an authorized rep for a real buyer. I'm starting to think I may have to go with the "principals only" principle.
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When is it ever in your interest to be dealing with someone who isn't the decision-maker, or who isn't qualified? 🤔
 
GeorgeK said:
When is it ever in your interest to be dealing with someone who isn't the decision-maker, or who isn't qualified? 🤔
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For the most part, I agree with that. But I also understand why a buyer might not want to reveal who they are, or that they may genuinely want the advice of a broker. Clearly there are a lot of potential buyer's that don't know much about domains and valuations. And I have had plenty of sales where a broker contacted me on behalf of a buyer and I ended up making a sale at a price I was happy with, or a broker has contacted me selling a domain and I bought at a price I was happy with. And since I occasionally broker sales for other people, it feels kinda hypocritical to refuse to talk to a broker when I'm selling.
 
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