Have you ever bought a site?

Over the last few years I've purchased many sites and sold a few, usually in the 4-5 figure amounts. Overall I'd say it worked well for me, when I was able to give enough attention to the newly acquired sites and had a clear plan to promote, improve them. Or just help them for a long enough time to earn my money back. However there were some bad deal as well.

I see this "trend" is picking up, many webmasters, as well as investors, are looking to acquiring some new web properties now.
But another trend I see is frequently people buy sites only to sell them less a few months later..

So I'm just curious to get some feedback here from you guys, have you bought a site? How did they work for you?

 

Good topic...I fall into the above category. I have sold sites up to a value of $1k. However, recently my main preference is to "flip" sites for a short term profit.

The market is buoyant and if you buy wisely, and are prepared to do a little SEO/linkbuilding, then there is always money to be made.

I buy sites cheap, spend a bit of time building links (say one month), wait for a PR update, then sell...linkbuilding adds value to the site.

 

I never really bought sites with the intention to flip, but I see that is quite popular now, lots of ebooks and membership sites on that topic. That should work well also since I see smaller sites sell quite cheap on DP so if you have ways to find good buyers there is some decent $$ to be made on the difference

 

Hoon, never thought of selling or purchasing any sites etc.. But if a site is giving good revenue why would someone sell it..

 

Why do people ever sell anything? To get money now

 

Well in generel I'm building my own sites and I keep them, even though I think about selling them from time to time. But right now for example I'm also looking for cheap sites to buy. Because I don't have the time to fully develope them.

I didn't decide now if I'm going to sell them again after a few month or if I'll keep them I guess it depends on how much time they cost and how much they are earing for me.

 

I buy and sell. The most I've ever sold one for is $2k and the most I've bought one for would only be about $50.

 

Yes I have.

Some good, some bad. Some I was buying for the script simply to rip apart. Others for the domain. It really is done on a case by case basis and the objectives.

 

I've bought and sold many sites. In the beginning it was mostly proxies, because I knew how to make nice networks, get traffic + revenue, and then I would sell them. I actually only made them to sell them.

Recently I bought a new website that will go hand in hand with another business I run, and the only reason I bought it is because I wanted a pre-made site with traffic/revenue/backlinks etc... I didnt want to do any of the legwork in the beginning.

I think the whole "site flipping" fad is starting to wear thin. I alot of people made a lot of money way back, but now it's starting to get a bit saturated. Only the people who know what they're doing are making any money doing it.

 

Yeah like anything based solely on arbitrage this can't last long, but if you know the niche and know how to improve the site and increase revenue significantly, as well where to find buyers who will pay more - it can work really well.

 

Normally i bought site just to park my unused money.
Coz if i park the money at bank then the interest is too low.
When i need money again then i resell the site at higher price.

 

no, i haven't bought any site yet, but i'm going to buy first this month... any tips?

 

I bought many but i got low profit on few and high on other.
But overall it increased my wealth.

 

I never purchased a site, but one time I was interested in doing so before I realized that most of the sites for sale are failures that do not generate much money so you are just buying a dying project. If you are a marketing expert willing to advertise nonstop everywhere and spend hundreds of dollars than sure you may be able to revive a dead site, but not everyone has that kind of time.

 

Of course, i usually buy PR5 or PR6 and sell links on it

 

Bought a few and flipped them. Didn't see any need to develop the sites when I could turn a 20 - 30 percent profit in under 48 hours.

 

Only ever sold a few sites, when I wanted to get out of the niche due to a changing 'tide' so to speak. Have wanted to buy a few and get more into the investing aspect, but it seems really sketchy to me, and it seems like everyone is inflating numbers or never providing the whole story. It's very easy to mislead when you're dealing with intangible products, but hopefully with time I'll get over this fear.

I see a lot of people claiming to be flippers...how can sites really be flipped though, wouldn't it be apparent (as a listing was probably public) that it was just bought for X price, and it's not worth Y% more after 24 hours?

 

I bought a couple sites before and i did some work on them (new features, new design, etc.) and then 'flipped' them for a nice profit. However, keeping a good site and having recurring income is usually a better option.

 

Yes i'm bought some site, some good/bad sites,domains .. and only i make money with this..

 

That doesn't always hurt. People usually buy sites based on what it's worth to them, not based on what the seller paid for it.