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I do a lot of acquisitions through direct contact with original owners of domain names. Ususally, I recieve one of the following responses to my inquiry emails:

1. “Yah I could be interested in selling, what do you have in mind?”
2. “Yes, the domain is for sale, $150,000″
3. …………… (no response)
4. “No, this domain is not for sale”

So, it was odd when I received a response urgently demanding that I make an offer as the owner had received 2 others recently and was making a decision that night. I prefer to do business via telephone, however the whois number was inaccurate. I responded asking for a phone number so I can make an offer that way. He responded that he will be making a decision before he goes to bed, and if I dont want to make an offer, thats fine.

So, after pressing me, I made what I felt like was a reasonable offer, but one where I could easily see a profit in flipping. I didnt hear a response the following day, so I sent a follow up email. I then got a response asking about escrow (which I had insisted if he accepted my offer). I explained the process and went out on a limb and initiated escrow via escrow.com. I told him he had 24 hours to accept before the offer gets pulled. This was my chance to press him in the hopes he accepts my offer.

So, here I stand in an uncomfortable position. Waiting impatiently to find out if the seller does in fact accept my offer, when my guess is he is using it to try and milk a better offer from any other interested party. I always prefer doing business over the phone. You get to actually interact and get a decent feel for that person and their intentions. I will update everyone later with the domain name, regardless of the outcome.

Justin