What the best way to grab an expiring domain?

With both hands, and dont let go...

namejet

GoDaddy has a backorder service for $20.00. I did a backorder using Network Solutions several years ago and was successful in obtaining my target URL.

not sure what works, but best is imho to have luck. and stay away of godaddy, anytime i tried, they always said sorry, we had no luck in backordering, doesnt matter if it was total useless domain for everyone, like my friends surname and czech name for what he is doing, everytime it was sorry, we was unsuccessful, but the domain was registered to go*domains, what is some godaddy whitelabel from the first look ... thieves, stay away from their backorder, and have luck!

depends on the current registrar.

We did a test with Godaddy on this very issue and never once had any luck.

That what I am scared of with godaddy. Just don't trust them

Once I contacted the owner directly, with in 30min they renewed and send me back a huge price tag on the domain!

Registrant:
DNS Admin
Serena Software, Inc.

what's the registrar?

Wear gloves, and stop checking if it's available yet every 5 minutes.

Open free accounts at the following places if the domain goes in to pending delete:

Snapnames.com
Namejet.com
Pool.com

You can also use godaddy.com but they only have a few registrars.

Find out when the domain drops exactly. Log in to namejet.com and do a domain search to find this out.

Make your bid on the domain, make the minimum possible bid DO NOT proxy bid! (Leave a higher offer) Make your bid at all 3 places I told you : snap/namejet/pool they have the largest combined registrar power.

Make the bid approx 30 minutes or less before the last possible time, this will be indicated at namejet. Do not order before this because domain squatters may see that there is interest in this domain.

If there are multiple bidders when the domain drops it will go in to private auction. If it goes in to private acution be there 10 min before the domain drops do not make a bid earlier you do not want the competition to have time to increase the bid...wait until 1 min before the domain drops and then increase your bid....this will prolong the auction for 5 min and the other guys are usually not there...