I will be moving out of state in a few months and am thinking about selling my website. It gets a continuous trickle of leads and can track 1 sale so far directly from the website.

It's established and has many incoming links and the traffic and leads keeps building.

I've had several calls and one in particular was very interested in my USP and how I rank so well when he did particular searches (he's a broker). When I told him I will be moving and may be selling my website, he said he would be interested.

Anyway, to my question. What would you charge to sell a real estate website that produces leads and already has at least one transaction directly from the website and ranks extremely well with yahoo and is indexed in all the other search engines?

The cost of at least 1 commission? ($8-10K or so?)
I really don't know.

Of course I'd transfer all his info and keep many of my real estate "feeder sites" still pointing to the site to keep traffic up to it.

I know there are plenty of details with this, but am just trying to get some possible figures and feedback on how to go about this if I decide to sell.

I'd appreciate any feedback.

Thanks,

Richard

Hmmm ... can you post some additional traffic / stats / monthly leads / lead conversions / income derived directly from the website here to perhaps "fine-tune" the eventual pricing? Is that one (1) sale in total ... over how long a period of time?

Hits / Page views / Visits / Origin of visits / UNIQUE visitors / and quality of those leads will surely be asked by a potential Buyer, IMHO. How much do these "feeder sites" increase the traffic of the core domain name / website to-be-sold?
Does it get HIGH (ie., first page) natural (generic) page rankings for your specific target area in each Google/Yahoo/MSN? Are Adwords and Yahoo/Overture "sponsored ads" utilized, as well ... and for how long?
Is it a highly visible, coveted domain name for your community, etc?
Sorry for the details (as you mention above), but the Devil's surely in there!

domain names, like houses, are worth what somone is willing to pay for it when you want to sell it.

For example I bought a domain name from another Realtor in Miami a few years ago. He was asking $800 but I negotiated him down to $400 and it turned out to be a great buy.

Instead of selling it for cash now you might consider asking for a referral fee from any business it might generate over the next year, say 25% with a minimum, guaranteed bottom price.

$8-10,000 bucks sounds pretty steep to me.

A friend of mine who's VERY Internet savvy sold the very desirable domain www.24.com several years ago for $5,000 to a company.

Richard,
off your question topic..can you share any tips on your polished your website to rank so well.

Appreciate your time

Thank You
Ritu

There are website appraisal companies out there. You can check out NamePros.com for great free advice.

Alright, just my 2 cents here, but I think that we need to remember that he is not just selling a domain name. He is selling an actual online business. The website and content are already designed and only minor changes would need to be made for the new owner. Also, he has advertised the site and it is getting traffic. This would be analogous to selling a business in a storefront you are leasing. You aren’t selling the real estate but rather the name and all the past advertising you have done to drive traffic to the store.

He has indicated that he can track 1 sale per month back to leads directly from the website. If 1 sale, in his market, is worth $10,000, then selling for that price would be a bargain. Taking the “referral fee” approach sounds good but the big question is how to track the leads?

I think that, if the situation is as you describe, then you are undervaluing the site. Selling it for cash may be difficult, but perhaps “leasing” it out or selling it on installments would be more palatable to potential buyers if the price is too high.

Again, I cant stress enough that you are selling a business here, the domain name is just a small piece of the business.

I hope these thoughts help. I would recommend contacting Alice Held of www.come2az.com as she did a quite good “exit” plan for internet sites and gave a presentation to the CyberStars (www.cyberstars.net) about this very topic. If you asked, perhaps she would send you the information in that presentation.

let us know what you actually sell this for.... including the terms....

I like the idea of selling leads and collecting referrals.

It's difficult to attribute sales to the domain, as a lot of the conversion rate will have to do with one's ability to close. I suppose it'd be easier to evaluate based on the volume of the captured leads although I haven't seen any industry-wide metrics on the dollar value of an Internet lead.