Buy/Sell Domain Names! Is it Profitable?

I've just recently stumbled across a few web sites like namepros.com and dnforum, websites that focus solely on the buying and selling of domains. And I "gotta tell ya" I was quit impressed to hear some of the success stories.

Now from my understanding, I thought profit from domain sales died at the end of the dotcom Boom. But from what I've seen and heard, It seems like it can be a lucrative business. Naturally there's more to it than buying a domain name for $5.99 a year and turning around and selling it for $4,000.

To come across a domain name (whether self created, expired, or purchased) spending time advertising it, sending traffic to where it's parked, finding a broker, doing the things you need to do to up the value of the name, it's seems like a very time consuming business. But if you go to Sedo.com you'd be amazed at the prices that some of these domains are going for, $5,000, $10,000, even more.

It seems to me like a hidden art. There's not very much talk about it in the general Internet marketing forums. And everywhere on the net you see ebooks on "How To" write ebooks for profit, do JV (joint venture) deals, ebooks on site traffic, blogging techniques, affiliate marketing, rss feeds...... on and on and on and very little information on the business of buying and selling domain names.

So that means it's a business who's time has passed or a very lucrative one that's hidden from the people who jump on the bandwagon. Just looking at current events and doing domain checks on certain subjects tells me how quickly good domains get snatched up. Believe it or not the name Farris Hassan dot com (16 year old boy who went to Iraq) is already taken. From my studies it seems that there are a select few who are generously profiting from the buying and selling of domain names.

As I mentioned above there is alot of work involved but if your willing to join a few membership sites, learn a few advertising tricks and get into the game, the selling of domain names can be a very lucrative business.