Current Observed Minimum Wholesale Price (regardless of Number combo) as of April 4, 2009:

• 3-Number .com - $7200 (Unchanged)
• 3-Number .net - $1000 (Unchanged)
• 3-Number .org - $400 (Unchanged)
• 3-Number .info - $260 (Unchanged)
• 3-Number .biz - $90 (Unchanged)
• 3-Number .us - $100 (Unchanged) (Note: These are the rarest of the NNN Domains, as the registry holds a high percentage of NNN.us names)
• 3-Number .mobi - $220 (Unchanged)

The quality of the Number composition can play a significant role in determining 3-number valuations. General concensus states that the numbers 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9 are considered premium numbers. Other lesser high quality numbers include: 4 and 6. Lower quality numbers include the number 0. 3-Number Domains selling for less than the above figures would represent a strong buy in today’s market. Premium number only domains tend to fetch a 300% to 400% premium (or more) over the Minimum Wholesale Price. Mixed number quality domains have valuations somewhere in the middle of these two extremes.

Of course, that’s ignoring the fact that .COM registrars now mandate a 3-character minimum length, so it wouldn’t be an option anyways.

Of the 17,576 possible three-letter sequences, again every single one is already taken. Adding digits to the mix (note that I’m intentionally ignoring obtuse dashes for such short domain names, though technically they are legal from the second character onwards), giving 46,656 permutations, yields a larger number of garbage domain entries (either REGISTRAR-LOCKED, REDEMPTIONPERIOD, or with no nameservers), giving a false hope of 228 seemingly open domains, yet they aren’t actually available.

If you’re dying to acquire great domains like 8VZ.com or Q6X.com, they’ll free up within a month, though it seems evident that there are swaths of domain speculators acquiring every variant when they come available, so they won’t go without a fight.

Stepping up to four letter sequences, choosing among the 456,976 combinations, yields a vastly greater availability — perhaps the set is a bit too large for domain speculators and their unlikely success with random sequences — with 97,786 showing as open. A quick check verifies that most are legitimately available. “Choice” domains, such as AGJV.com, EIYK.com, GZVW.com, and QFEV.com. Adding digits into the mix and there are a massive 1.16 million open domains, so long as you’re looking for something like 7RG8.com, or U3JZ.com. Choose one and then manufacture a ridiculous backronym to explain it.

Going to 5-letter sequences (yet another five-letter acronym? YAFLA?), and of course the possibilities are rich, again presuming that you’re willing to accept an arbitrary sequence of letters and/or digits, creating a backronym to match. Using just letters you have a rich 11,881,376 possibilities, of which approximately 11,015,028 are unclaimed.