> This experience left me convinced that Namecheap is holding onto domains to make a profit. I'm curious if anyone else has had similar issues with Namecheap and if there are other trustworthy registrars to consider. If you have any recommendations, please let me know. I'm in search of a reliable and safe option for domain registration.

'Make a profit'. God forbid a business does something to 'make a profit'.

Entirely unclear why people seem to believe that domain names are something of a public trust and should go by different rules than any other object or item a private company can profit from. I've noted this attitude literally since the 1990's with public comments about domain names or registrars.

There is nothing at all wrong, illegal or unscrupulous with a domain name registrar - if a domain is not paid for by their customer - with the registrar holding that domain to auction it or sell to another party.

And in fact many if not most registrars do a version of this (Godaddy as only one example). ICANN allows this as long as the contract that the customer signed or says has this possibility pointed out. ICANN does require domains that are not paid for deleted but doesn't prevent a registrar from deleting the domain from the customer account and then taking possession of the domain in order to resell it. (Prior info refers to .com .net .org .info and other common tld's).