Never have, or if I'm interested I get bidding out 😛 I look at what I can afford or what I think it's worth then I stick at it, if it goes over then nope. Seen the good and the bad, a great site that has been brought over then got killed by the new ownership and didn't last and ended its life 🙁 not often that you see a terrible forum that new ownership has taken it over and made it super cool 🙂
Would you ever buy an existing forum?
If it does internet me then maybe at a good deal or whatnot, You get those that don't care and want to get rid of it at any price point and others what the highest point.
Do you think it would be a smart investment and how much would you spend?
It can be if you know what the flip you are doing, depends on the subject of what the forum is about and what you can offer or not. Takin's new owner doesn't mean to change everything if it's working.
Would the forum have to be active?
Nope, active would be great, less work to deal with 😛 But if the forums is not active and willing to work to improve, always you get the right price doesn't it right?
Do you think the community would accept you as their new owner/Admin?
Do they have a choice? Maybe they love him/her or not. they can stay or go.
Would you make any changes or leave things alone?
Depends if they are working or not,
I did the opposite sort of? It's based on a forum custom made software that was inspired by another big forum back in the old days of the WWW. I made my own forum using it from scratch, so no users, posts, etc. It had a profile pic system but somebody did some hacky type stuff to ruin it for everyone.
Sadly it has not taken off as I had hoped. Some old users from the old forum have registered, but don't post much or often. I think buying a forum can be a good and a bad thing. It's good that the sites owner knows when they cannot manage the site anymore. It's bad cause some users/members will leave after any sort of change like ownership.
1. I bought out my competition for over $1,000. I ended up losing that forum due to significant database issues later on and was just burned out to continue. I left forums for quite a few years after that.
2. Probably around that era, I bought a forum for under $100. Later found out the guy just reinstalled the database I bought on other forums and resold it over and over again.
I'd rather try to make it on my own now. I don't want to buy it and then later regret it.
I started my webmaster forum and some weeks, I'm just not active. But I get on it when I get in the mood. If you buy an existing forum, you really need to be committed to the community you're buying out.
I once bought a forum for under $100. There were not many members and not many posts, however, I really liked the topic and the domain was an old one, it was not keyword rich but an interesting domain. Would I buy another forum again, possibly not. I would prefer to develop my own forum.
I myself would definitely consider buying a forum if it was already quite established and had a community as I would love to be able to take over and keep a community going. In terms of making any changes, it is possible that I would but it wouldn't be in terms of taking anything away that was already in place but maybe adding new things in that would help the forum. I would hope that the current members would be happy with me as their new admin/owner of the forum.
