Section

The domain purchase process, end to end

These guides follow a single deal in order, from the point an offer is accepted to the moment the name sits in the buyer's own registrar account.

A domain purchase runs through the same sequence whether the name is worth a modest amount or a great deal more. Terms are agreed, a payment route is chosen, money is placed somewhere, the name is unlocked and moved, and the new holder secures the account. Each of those steps has a failure mode, and most of them are avoidable by knowing what the next step needs before starting the current one.

What the guides cover

The first group deals with the agreement: what has to be written down, how to confirm the person selling actually controls the name, and whether a broker adds anything a direct deal does not.

The second group deals with money: the differences between bank transfer, escrow, card, PayPal and crypto, why some of those can be reversed weeks after the name has gone, how escrow sequences the release of funds, what an invoice for a domain sale should contain, and how instalment arrangements work when the buyer pays over time.

The third group deals with the handover itself: registrar push versus registry transfer, auth codes and why they expire, the locks and waiting periods that stall a deal for weeks, and how the mechanism differs across the common extensions.

How to use them

Read in order for a first deal. For a deal already in progress, go straight to the stage that is stuck. Two questions cause most of the delay: whether the name is locked or inside a waiting period, and who was supposed to pay the escrow cost. Both are settled faster before the offer is accepted than after.

The checklists condense the same material into lists that can be run through in a few minutes, and the reference section explains the terms that appear in registrar dashboards and escrow flows without translation.

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01How escrow works in a domain saleEscrow puts a neutral party between payment and handover so that neither side has to move first on trust. The value is entirely in the sequence.02Domain payment methods comparedThe payment method decides which side of a domain deal carries the risk during the gap between money moving and the name moving.03Who pays the escrow feeThe escrow cost is small next to the price and causes a disproportionate number of stalled deals, because it is usually the last thing anyone agrees.04Paying a domain seller in another countryCross border payments add three things to a domain deal: a currency decision, a chain of banks nobody controls, and a compliance check that can hold funds without notice.05Chargebacks and reversals in domain salesSome payments are final on arrival and some are not. The difference decides whether a seller is safe once the name has gone.06Lease to own domain purchasesIn a lease to own deal the buyer uses the domain immediately and pays over time, while ownership only moves once the final instalment clears.07Invoices and VAT on a domain saleA domain sale is a supply of services, not goods, which decides how the invoice is written and where the tax is due.08Spotting payment fraud in domain dealsDomain fraud is repetitive. The same handful of setups account for nearly all of it, and each one has signals that appear before the money moves.09Verifying the sellerThree checks separate a genuine seller from someone offering a name they do not hold: the registration record, a live proof of control, and a payment account that matches the counterparty.10Purchase agreement essentialsA domain purchase agreement can be one page. What it cannot be is silent on who transfers what, by when, and what happens when the transfer does not work.11Broker or direct dealA broker is worth paying when the obstacle is finding or persuading the other side. On a name already listed at a stated price, a broker mostly adds a layer.12How a domain name changes handsA domain sale ends in one of two technical moves: a push inside a single registrar, or a transfer between two different ones. The choice decides how long handover takes and when control becomes real.13Auth codes explainedThe authorisation code is the single credential that allows a domain to move between registrars. Handing one over is the point of no return in most deals, so the checks around it matter more than the code itself.14Registrar locks and waiting periodsMost failed handovers are not fraud. They are a lock nobody removed or a waiting period nobody checked before agreeing a deadline.15Transfer rules by extensionEvery registry runs its own transfer procedure. Agreeing a handover deadline without knowing which one applies is the most common way a clean deal turns into a dispute.16The first week after paymentA domain is not safe because it arrived. It is safe once the account holding it answers only to the buyer, with the previous holder cut out of every route back in.