The first major step in becoming an ICANN accredited registrar is to decide if you want to purchase an existing registrar or apply for ICANN accreditation.

Buying an ICANN accredited registrar will most likely allow you to get your business up and running a lot faster than applying for the accreditation. The price of an accredited registrar is typically around $10,000. There might be other fees associated with buying a registrar like lawyer consultation fees. One major up side in buying an existing registrar is that you will start with clients. The business will also be up and running a lot quicker than it would be if you are applying for ICANN accreditation. Most registrars that are available for purchase will allow their clients to purchase .COM or .NET names, but not all of them will allow it. There are registrars out there that will not allow their users to register .COM or .NET, instead they offer other TLDs like .XYZ or .CLUB. This can be a pro or a con depending on what you plan to do with the registrar, so it is best to research the registrar you are planning to buy.

Before buying an existing registrar, you should be aware of what contractual agreement the registrar currently has. You do not want to be buying into something that might limit what you plan to do with the company. When buying a registrar, you will have to notify ICANN of the change in ownership of the registrar. You will probably have to go through ICANN’s Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA).

The other open is to apply for ICANN accreditation. One thing to note is about the application process is that it will cost $3,500 to apply. The major benefit from apply for an ICANN accreditation is that you will have no prior obligation from any contractual agreements. You can develop your own brand without any limitations like purchasing an existing company. One major issue with applying for ICANN accreditation is that it might take months before you can get your application processed.

If you are in no rush in getting an ICANN accreditation, it might be better to apply for ICANN accreditation. While it can take months to get the application processed, you have more control of what you can do with the registrar. There will be no previous contractual obligations and you can ensure that it will not have any negative connotations attached to the brand.

1. The government froze .COMs prices in 2012 at $7.85 per domain name.

Originally there was a price increase of 7% per year from 2007.

VeriSign has a deal with ICANN for the .COM domains that originally allowed them to increase the price of the .COM domain registration by 7% per year. The U.S. government came in and froze the price at $7.85 in 2012. The contract was originally suppose to end at 2018, but VeriSign and ICANN renegotiated the contract to end at 2024. This article goes into more detail on the ICANN and VeriSign deal.

This chart details the price increase for .COM domains with the original price of $6.00.

Price (.COM)	% Increase
$6.00 (Original Price)	7%
$6.42 (2007)	7%
$6.86	7%
$7.34	7%
$7.85 (2012)	7%

2. .NET prices did not increase every year until 2012 at 10%.

The price of .Net domains did not increase consistently at 10% until 2012. Originally the price increase were more sporadic before 2012. With the upcoming price increase of .NET domain names in February 2017, we have created a list of all the price increase on .NET names going back to 2007. The original price of a .NET domain was $3.50 and the price of these domains have been increasing by 10% each year starting from 2012. The price of a domain in $4.65 in 2012 and it will cost $8.20 on February 2017. This article talks about the first price hike for .COM and .NET.

The list of all the price increases from VeriSign over the years with .NET and a projection on what it will cost in 2024.

Price (.NET)	% Increase
3.50 (Original Price)	10%
3.85 (2007)	10%
4.23 (2008)	10%
4.65	10%
5.11 (2012)	10%
5.62 (2013)	10%
6.18 (2014)	10%
6.79 (2015)	10%
7.46 (2016)	10%
8.20 (2017)	10%
9.02 (2018)	10%
9.92 (2019)	10%
10.91 (2020)	10%
12.00(2021)	10%
13.20(2022)	10%
14.52(2023)	10%
15.97(2024)	10%

 

3. VeriSigns contract with ICANN for the .COM and .NET domains expire in 2024.

This article goes more in-depth into the deal with VeriSign and ICANN.

4. If domains are 7.85? How does GoDaddy sell it for $.99?

The answer? They can’t. GoDaddy is charging you $.99 cents for the first year and it is $14.99 the second year. You must buy a domain for 2 years for a total amount of $15.98. If you divide that by 2 years it is $7.99, still making a profit. Here is their actual disclaimer.

* Plus ICANN fee of $0.18 per domain name per year. $0.99* price good for the first year of one new or transfer .com per customer. Additional years or .COMs may be purchased for $14.99* per year. Discounts cannot be used in conjunction with any other offer or promotion. Not all payment methods valid with this offer, acceptable payments will display in cart at checkout. Your discount will be applied in your shopping cart. After the initial purchase term, discounted products will renew at the then-current renewal rate. GoDaddy reserves the right to deny use of this offer and/or cancel domains purchased using this offer if the offer is abused or used fraudulently, as determined by GoDaddy in its sole discretion.