← Tools Free Tool

Dormancy Signals Score

A dormant property is one whose owner has stopped investing while the asset still shows signs of life. A dead property has lost the life too. This scorer helps you tell them apart from the outside, using what's public, before you ever contact an owner.

Score each of the five signals from 0 to 4. The total, out of 20, suggests what to do next. The book describes what a 0 and a 4 look like; anything in between is your judgment.

The five-signal score
Score the property
Everything here is observable without logging in to anything you don't own.
Owner drift
Scores 0Owner active every day
Scores 4Owner's attention clearly elsewhere; nothing from them in three months or more
Owner drift, 0 to 4
Signs of life
Scores 0No audience activity in 30 days
Scores 4Activity held steady, or grew, in the owner's absence
Signs of life, 0 to 4
Untouched revenue
Scores 0Several revenue paths already running
Scores 4Never monetized, and the audience is one sponsors already pay to reach
Untouched revenue, 0 to 4
Personality vacuum
Scores 0The audience follows the owner's voice
Scores 4The property runs on its own; a new steward would read as an improvement
Personality vacuum, 0 to 4
Price realism
Scores 0The owner wants a fantasy number
Scores 4The owner wants relief or good hands and is open to a fair structure
Price realism, 0 to 4
Total 0 / 20

0 of 5 signals scored

Score all five signals to see the suggested next step.
16–20

Verify the numbers and make an approach this week.

11–15

Rent the corner or run a test send before you talk price (Chapter 16).

6–10

Add it to the pipeline file and rescore in two months. Drift compounds.

0–5

Skip it.

Override: dead, not dormant. Owner drift at 4 with signs of life at 0 means dead, not dormant, whatever the total says.
Override: partner, don't buy. A personality vacuum at 0 means the audience follows the person, so partner with the founder instead of buying.
Before you score

Every signal is a starting point. The real numbers come from the source systems, verified live with the owner's permission, and from the platform's terms, read at the time of the deal. Read what's public, then ask the owner.

A quiet asset is still somebody's asset. Never log in to, recover, reset, guess, claim or take over any account, channel, list, repository, domain or community that isn't yours.

Not legal, tax, investment, or financial advice. Buying, leasing, optioning or reviving someone else's channel, list, community, software, domain or business involves contracts, platform terms, privacy law, intellectual property, and sometimes securities law. Talk to a lawyer licensed in your state before you sign anything or move any money. Platform terms decide: if a transfer would break them, the deal is off.

From The Un-Founder

This rubric is Appendix A of The Un-Founder: An Operator's Playbook for Dormant Assets, which adapts the abandonment signals from the tollstack.dev article The Abandoned Lot. The appendix also lists signs of life and signs of death for each kind of asset, from channels and lists to software, domains and books of business.

Get the book on Kindle · Reader kit and printable checklists

← Back to Tools