Domain escrow: how the money and the name change hands safely

Two parties, one transaction, and neither has any sensible reason to move first. The buyer is sitting on money the seller cannot see. The seller is sitting on an asset the buyer can inspect only through a WHOIS record and a certain amount of hope. Wire the funds and the name may never arrive. Push the name and the funds may never land. Reversing either is slow, expensive, or flatly impossible.

Escrow deletes the question. A licensed third party takes the money, holds it while the domain moves, and pays out only once the buyer has confirmed the name is sitting in an account they control. That is the whole mechanism. It is also why almost every domain sale above a few hundred pounds goes through one.

Six steps, none of which require trust

The shape of a normal escrowed sale:

• Terms agreed. Price, currency, who covers the escrow fee, whether the name moves registrar or stays where it is, and any extras: social handles, logo files, existing traffic redirects.
• Escrow opened. One side starts the transaction and both verify identity. Expect ID checks, and on larger sums, questions about where the money came from. That is regulation, not bureaucratic theatre.
• Buyer funds. The money goes to the escrow agent and sits there. The seller can see it has arrived and cannot lay a finger on it.
• Seller releases the domain. Either by unlocking it and handing over an authorisation code, or by pushing it internally to an account the buyer controls at the same registrar.
• Buyer confirms. They log in, see the name in their own account, and confirm receipt. There is normally an inspection window of a few days.
• Funds released. The agent pays the seller, less fees.

On Names.com, marketplace sales run through escrow by default, so nobody is asked to hand over money or a name on faith. Sellers pay 15% commission, and only on a completed sale. Buyers pay no marketplace fee at all.

A push takes minutes; a transfer takes days

Two mechanisms move a domain, and which one you use decides your timeline.

Same registrar, same afternoon

If buyer and seller both hold accounts at the same registrar, the seller pushes the name internally. Often minutes. Occasionally an hour or two. No authorisation code, no 60-day waiting period, no transfer request quietly expiring while both sides assume the other is handling it. If the name sits at a registrar where you can open an account without drama, ask for a push. It removes most of what goes wrong.

Registrar to registrar, and the five-day clock

If the buyer wants the name at their own registrar, the seller unlocks it, switches off transfer protection and supplies the EPP or authorisation code. The buyer starts the transfer at the gaining registrar. The losing registrar then has up to five days to let go, though many move faster when the seller approves manually.

Two rules catch people out. ICANN applies a 60-day transfer lock after a change of registrant on most gTLDs, and again after any previous inter-registrar transfer. So if the seller bought the name recently or tidied up the owner details last week, it is not leaving that registrar for two months. Nobody is obstructing you; it is policy. A same-registrar push is unaffected by the lock, which is the workaround. The second trap is expiry. If the domain is inside 30 days of its renewal date, ask the seller to renew before anything else happens. A year on the clock buys everyone room to breathe.

The fee is trivial. The exchange rate might not be.

Standalone escrow services generally charge in the region of 0.5% to 3% of the transaction value, with the percentage dropping as the deal grows, and a floor of roughly £10 to £25 on small ones. Wire transfers can attract a fixed bank charge at either end. Card payments usually sit at a higher rate than bank transfer, because the escrow agent is carrying chargeback risk and prices it accordingly.

Trade convention says the buyer pays, or the two sides split it. It is negotiable and it is small against the purchase price, so it is rarely worth the argument. Worth pinning down instead: whether the quoted price includes the fee, and which currency the escrow account settles in. A 2% move in the exchange rate on a five-figure name will cost you more than the escrow ever did.

On a marketplace deal, escrow handling is usually built into the platform's process rather than invoiced separately. If you are buying a category killer domain name at five or six figures, get the buyer's total outlay confirmed in writing before you fund anything.

When the money arrives in pieces

Plenty of deals do not settle in one payment. Two structures come up repeatedly, and both change how escrow behaves.

Instalment purchase. The buyer pays across 12 to 60 months and takes ownership at the end. Through the term the domain sits in a controlled account, either the escrow agent's or the marketplace's, with the buyer holding delegated control of the nameservers. You can point it at your site and start building on day one; the registrant record only changes hands with the final payment. Miss payments and access goes, usually after a defined cure period, along with everything you have already paid in. Read that clause twice.

Lease. Monthly payment for use of the name, no ownership transfer, sometimes with a purchase option at a fixed price. Good for testing a brand before you commit capital. It also means your domain, and every backlink pointing at it, rests on a contract you do not own. If you take this route with a keyword domain on monthly payments, fix the buyout price at the start rather than renegotiating later, when you have far more to lose than the other side does.

Where these deals actually fall apart

• The seller will not verify. Escrow agents run identity checks on both parties. A seller stalling on theirs is the loudest warning in the entire process.
• The registrant is not the person negotiating. Ask for proof of control before funding. A temporary DNS TXT record at a string you choose is quick, free and settles it.
• Off-platform payment requests. Any suggestion of moving to a direct bank transfer, a payment app or crypto "to save the fee" ends the conversation. This is the most common domain fraud pattern in existence.
• Locks nobody bothered to check. Look at the domain's status codes before you agree a timeline. A clientTransferProhibited flag is routine and removable. A 60-day registrar lock is neither.
• Silence in the inspection window. Buyers forget to confirm receipt. Most agents auto-release when the window closes, which is fine if the name arrived and a genuine problem if it did not. Confirm actively.
• Extras agreed verbally. Social handles, trademarks and email archives are not part of a domain transfer unless the escrow instructions say they are. Write them in as release conditions.

What to confirm before you fund

• The WHOIS or registrar record matches the seller's verified identity.
• Expiry is more than 60 days out, or the seller has renewed.
• You know whether this is a push or a transfer, and roughly how long it should take.
• The escrow instructions list every asset in the deal, not only the domain.
• You have checked the name for trademark conflicts in your sector. Escrow protects the transaction, not your right to use the brand.
• Total cost, fees and currency conversion included, is agreed in writing.

If the name is still on a shortlist rather than in a negotiation, sort availability and alternatives out long before you go near an escrow form. A keyword domain finder will tell you quickly whether what you want is for sale, registered and sitting dormant, or genuinely open. Escrow is the last mile of a purchase. It should be the dullest part of the whole exercise.