The offer is accepted. The number is final. Now what?
For most buyers and sellers, the window between “we agreed” and “the domain is in its new account” is the part of the deal they understand least. It’s also the part where deals go sideways most often — not through bad faith, but through small mistakes in a process neither side does very often.
This is a plain-English walkthrough of what happens, who does what, and how to avoid the common snags.
The high-level shape
From the moment both parties say yes, a normal domain transfer follows the same five-stage structure:
- Escrow opened. The escrow service receives the deal details and generates funding instructions for the buyer.
- Funds deposited. Buyer wires the money. Escrow confirms and notifies the seller that funding is locked.
- Domain handover initiated. Seller pushes the domain to the buyer’s account (same-registrar push) or releases it with an auth code (registrar-to-registrar transfer).
- Inspection period. Buyer verifies they control the domain. This runs 24-72 hours in most cases.
- Funds released. Escrow pays the seller, minus fees. The deal is closed.
Total elapsed time for a smooth deal: 2-5 business days. Deals that hit snags can drag to 2-3 weeks.
Push vs transfer: which route, and why it matters
There are two mechanically different ways to move a domain between accounts, and they have very different characteristics.
Registrar push (same-registrar). If buyer and seller both have accounts at the same registrar (both at GoDaddy, both at Namecheap, both at Dynadot, etc.), the seller can “push” the domain directly to the buyer’s account. The domain never leaves the registrar; it just changes ownership within their system. This is fast — often minutes — and has very few failure points.
Registrar-to-registrar transfer. If the two parties are at different registrars, the seller unlocks the domain and releases an authorization code (sometimes called an EPP code, transfer code, or auth key). The buyer initiates a transfer at their registrar using the code; their registrar contacts the losing registrar; the losing registrar confirms with the seller. The whole dance takes 5-7 days by ICANN rules, though it can be sped up in some cases.
When practical, a push is the preferred route. If the seller is at, say, GoDaddy and the buyer isn’t, it’s often worth the buyer opening a GoDaddy account specifically to receive the push, then initiating a transfer to their preferred registrar a few weeks later. A same-registrar push eliminates most of the common transfer failures.
The 60-day transfer lock
One surprise for many first-time domain buyers: ICANN rules lock a domain from outbound transfer for 60 days after any change of registrant (owner). If a seller recently acquired the domain, or recently updated the WHOIS, the domain may not be transferable for up to 60 days.
This lock doesn’t prevent a same-registrar push — those still work. But it does prevent a registrar-to-registrar transfer. If the buyer wants the domain at a specific registrar and the seller is at a different one, the 60-day lock can force either:
- A push to an account the buyer opens at the seller’s registrar, then a later transfer out (adding 60 days to the holding period before that transfer works).
- A delay while waiting for the lock to expire.
- A negotiation on who pays for the extra hassle and time.
Ask about this early. A seller who recently acquired the name or changed WHOIS should flag it during negotiation, not during the transfer. It’s not a dealbreaker, but it’s a scheduling constraint worth knowing about.
The auth code: what it is, when to share it
For registrar-to-registrar transfers, the auth code is the key that unlocks the domain at its current registrar so it can move. It’s a 12-32 character string, sometimes containing special characters.
The discipline around the auth code:
- Never share it before escrow is funded. A domain with its auth code out in the wild can be transferred by anyone who has it, regardless of ownership intentions. Until funds are locked, the seller’s leverage is the auth code.
- Share it through escrow. Most escrow services provide a structured field to record the auth code, which only the buyer can see after funding. This is cleaner than pasting it in email.
- Watch for typos. Some auth codes contain characters (commas, ampersands, asterisks) that get mangled in certain email clients. If a transfer attempt fails with an invalid code, the most common cause is a copy-paste error or a character that was transformed by email formatting.
The inspection period
Once the transfer completes, the buyer has a window — typically 1-3 days on domain escrow — to verify that what they got matches what was promised. In practice, this means:
- The domain is in their account with full admin rights.
- The domain has the expected expiration date (a seller can’t offload a name that expires next week without disclosing it).
- Any bundled assets (website files, email setup, redirects) are as agreed.
If everything checks out, the buyer accepts the milestone and escrow releases funds. If they don’t, this is the window to raise it. Silence during inspection typically counts as acceptance — the funds release automatically when the timer runs out.
The common failure modes
A short catalog of what goes wrong in transfers, ranked by how often I see them:
Auth code rejected. Usually a copy-paste issue with special characters. Ask the seller to resend the code in a plain-text format, not inside a formatted email.
Domain not unlocked. Sellers sometimes forget to disable the transfer lock before releasing the auth code. The buyer’s transfer attempt will fail with a generic error until the seller toggles the lock off.
WHOIS privacy blocking confirmations. Some registrars send the transfer confirmation to the email on the WHOIS record, not the registrar account. If the domain has WHOIS privacy enabled, the confirmation email bounces off a forwarding service that may be slow or broken. Disabling WHOIS privacy for the duration of the transfer is the fix.
Buyer account not verified. Some registrars require email or phone verification before they’ll accept a transfer. Buyers who open a new account specifically to receive a domain sometimes miss this step and stall the inbound transfer.
The 60-day lock surprise. Covered above. Easy to miss if the seller doesn’t mention it.
Registrar of record dispute. Rare, but occasionally two parties think they have authority to approve a transfer (e.g., an agency that managed a domain on behalf of a client and still has admin access). Sort this out before escrow, not during.
Who does what, in order
For a clean transfer, the sequence from both sides:
Buyer: 1. Confirms the price and agrees to terms. 2. Opens escrow (usually the marketplace does this automatically). 3. Wires funds to escrow. Confirms receipt. 4. If same-registrar push: provides their account identifier (username, account number) to the seller. 5. If registrar-to-registrar transfer: receives auth code via escrow, initiates transfer at their registrar, approves confirmation emails. 6. Verifies ownership of the domain. 7. Accepts the inspection milestone.
Seller: 1. Confirms the price. 2. Waits for escrow funding confirmation. 3. If same-registrar push: executes the push to the buyer’s account. 4. If transfer: disables transfer lock, retrieves auth code, shares via escrow. 5. Responds to any registrar confirmation requests. 6. Waits for escrow release.
That’s really the whole thing. Clean transfers are boring. The pattern is the same every time; the mistakes are always one of a small handful.
How Deepnom handles it
When an offer is accepted on Deepnom, the system automatically opens an escrow transaction at Escrow.com with the agreed price, both email addresses, and the domain name. From there, Escrow.com runs the milestones — funding, transfer, inspection, release — and notifies both parties at each stage.
The chat room stays open throughout. If either party has a question mid-transfer (“which auth code format does your registrar want,” “did you get the verification email”), the conversation continues in one place instead of spawning new email threads.
If something stalls, Deepnom support can see the escrow status and help unstick it. But the money and the domain never pass through us — the funds live at Escrow.com, the domain lives at the registrars, and Deepnom coordinates the messages and the paperwork.
The takeaway
A domain transfer is not a complicated process, but it’s an unfamiliar one, and unfamiliarity is what creates the small mistakes that turn a 3-day handover into a 2-week slog. Knowing the shape of the thing — push vs transfer, auth code discipline, the 60-day lock, the inspection period — is 80% of what makes it go smoothly.
If you’re buying or selling for the first time, read this once before the deal starts. You’ll recognize the moves as they happen, spot the snags early, and close on schedule.