HomeTools.com - $6,000 - Why?
March 27th, 2008 
HomeTools.com sold on NameJet today for a staggering $6,000. When I noticed it going up and up today I had to ask myself, Why? Am I just plane missing something about this domain name? It has practically no backlinks, gets no traffic by any of my indications. The keywords themselves seem to be akward. I dont think Ive ever used the phrase “Home Tools”. Even the phrase “Home Tools” only appears on google about 670,000 times. The .net is parked on a coming soon page and the .org Im not even sure qualifies as a developed site.
So, whats the deal? Is it the spirit of competition thats driving these prices up? Or is the high bidder out of his/her mind? (On a side note, the winning bidders handle on NameJet, is “fool”). If I’ve missed something, please don’t hesitate to correct me, I am genuinely curious why this domain sold for so much.
Justin
I think because HomeMart.com sold for like $25,000
Comment by Bonkers — March 27, 2008 @ 3:56 pm
It may not be a good name in the sense of a generic thing (ie, what is a home tool) but it is a fairly brandable name for a site dedicated to household tips, home financing information etc.
worth $6k? Not to me.
Comment by Gordon — March 27, 2008 @ 4:33 pm
I’m with you, Justin. Not worth a penny over, umm, $250? And that only because of the word tools. Hard to say what this person is thinking, but then, I wouldn’t have paid $1,000,000 for rebates.com either (as a friend of mine did). But he and his partners have a development plan for that name that wholly depended on them owning that domain (and the plural, too), and I’ve never once seen him lose money. While $6K for this name seems like a lot, it all depends on what the gameplan is for development. Otherwise, “fool” indeed.
Comment by Bob Amend — March 27, 2008 @ 4:57 pm
Bonkers,
Perhaps, but HomeMart to me makes sense. HomeTools, doesn’t - unless this is intended to be a brand. The problem I had is this isn’t the end-user with intentions to brand or develop, but rather a couple domain investors who bid this domain up.
Even with that, I find it difficult to understand why several domain investors would be bidding this one up. I suppose we’ll find out who it is within the next 24 hours.
Justin
Comment by admin — March 27, 2008 @ 5:07 pm
When I saw the words “Home Tools”. Immediately, I thought “oh, stuff to make things at home easier or maybe to help make life easier at home with household helpers (jar openers, out of reach lightbulb changer, clever kitchen stuff etc.)”.
I asked my mom who happened to be visiting just now, what came to mind when I asked her what “home tools” meant to her. The same thing.
lol, uh… I’m not saying you’re not domesticated or anything
BTW I added your link namebio.com to my blogroll. I’ve used your listings all the time for research…
John
http://unplain.com
Comment by John Bomhardt — March 27, 2008 @ 5:27 pm
John,
I can see the two working together, its not completely unfounded and Im not even arguing the name to have no value. My issue is with how much. Sure, I get the idea - its a site about tools specifically used in home. However, for an expression Ive never heard before, going upwards of $6,000 seems a stretch, no?
Justin
Comment by admin — March 27, 2008 @ 6:01 pm
I agree it is kinda high for not being a common expression. I would say whoever bidded has some kind of specific plan for it (hopefully) due to its clever recognizable word combos… we’ll see.
John
http://unplain.com
Comment by John Bomhardt — March 27, 2008 @ 9:21 pm
6k for this name was a fair deal - Easily brandable name.
Comment by Alan — March 28, 2008 @ 2:00 am
Alan,
Maybe, for the end user. Not a reseller. Still waiting to see who the knew owner is. We should know later today if payment is completed.
Justin
Comment by admin — March 28, 2008 @ 11:14 am
Has anybody searched home tools on Google? No quotes? I get 146,0000,000 and at least 7 pages of sponsered ads. I didn’t bother to look any further.
Point is, advertisers are paying to be found when people search home tools, home, or tools. If you go to Google’s traffic estimator you can see that home tools avg cpc is .84-1.05, estimated clicks is 1,174-1,312 a day, costing you an ad budget of roughly $1,200 to buy the 1-3 position on the page. EVERY DAY. That is $438,000 a year….
“home tools” exact match, is 1.14-1.43 avg cpc. Est clicks only 12-19, cost per day roughly $25.
That is $9,125 per year! Multiply an avg of those examples by the years a company plans to spend in business and sell online and you can see why $6,000 for hometools.com is a bargain.
You don’t need branding, you need a little SEO, and it will naturally rank. just point the servers to your company that sells tools and you have saved yourself thousands in Adwords….
You can see why so many domains remain undervalued, nobody is looking at what the alternative is if your competitor owns it!
Comment by Kelly Lieberman — March 28, 2008 @ 12:45 pm
Comment to post #10.
The fact here is…. NOBODY searches for the term! 4 whole people a day search for the exact “home tools”. So who cares how many people advertise for the term, they clearly do not see what people are searching for then! “Home Inspection Tools” 42 people daily search for, or “Home Depot Tools” 36 people daily search for.
It was a bad buy at $6K. No Alexa rank, 1 indexed page on google, 8 total links according to MarketLeap.com and 4 daily searches =’s a bad buy at that price.
Comment by Jamie — March 28, 2008 @ 1:06 pm
Just Google home tools. Go 100 pages out and you will see sponsored links with home tools highlighted. There are a lot of businesses using the keywords home and tools in their very expensive ads…If they aren’t getting results they probably would stop advertising.
Makes you wonder about the analytics and metrics that the domain industry uses in determining value.
Comment by Kelly Lieberman — March 28, 2008 @ 2:08 pm
Kelly,
When you look at just the first page after googling (home tools) - not a single one of the results uses the exact term. Many of them possess both keywords, but not next to eachother. For example:
Here are some of the titles:
- Home Science Tools
- Home Improvement Tools
- Bosch Tools Homepage
As you pointed out, there are several advertisers. But many of those advertisers are the same ones who buy EVERY keyword imaginable (the long tailed ones) and hope to make a few bucks.
Shop.com
Amazon.com
Shopzilla.com
Only a few legitimate advertisers like Lowes are advertising the terms. And they are advertising them because they are advertising for anything that could be compared with tools. This domain name may get a trickle of traffic from a type in here or there, but it is not getting enough traffic or paying enough for the search term that would make it worth it for 6k.
Comment by admin — March 28, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
Justin, even Estibot did not think it was worth that, although it’s been accused of overestimating values before: Estibot says $3,400 for HomeTools.com
I think I would have paid around $3k for this had I been bidding.
I can see why this would be worth $6k though. It’s extremely brandable, and memorable, perfect name for a major tools/home improvement site, and the home improvement business is, well, gigantic.
Cheers
Comment by Esa — March 29, 2008 @ 5:14 am