Web Designer Won't Give You Your Website? Houston
Get Your Domain Back. Keep Your Rankings. Move On.
Old web designer or agency won't hand over your domain or site? Houston businesses: get your domain back, keep your content and rankings, and move on.
How a Website Gets Held Hostage
It's rarely one dramatic betrayal. It's usually a slow slide, and it ends the same way: you want to leave and find you don't control the things that matter.
The domain is in their account
Someone registered your domain "to make it easy", under their login. Now the person who controls where your website and email point isn't you.
The site is on a builder nobody can log into
The Wix or GoDaddy account belongs to a former employee or a designer who moved on. Nobody knows the password, and the site can't be edited or moved.
Every change is a ticket and an invoice
A headline edit takes two weeks and a minimum charge. You stop asking, and the site goes stale.
Leaving looks like starting over
A new agency quotes a full rebuild and says nothing about your rankings. Staying feels cheaper than moving, and that's exactly the trap.
How Houston Businesses Get Their Website Back
- Secure the domain. Get it transferred to a registrar account in your business's name. Until this is done, nothing else is safe.
- Take a baseline. Record what Google sees today: Search Console clicks and positions, page speed, and every live URL.
- Copy what's yours. Content, images, reviews, form data and customer lists come out before anything is switched off.
- Rebuild and redirect. The new site goes up with every old URL mapped to its new page, so rankings carry over instead of disappearing into 404s.
- Switch and check. Point the domain, submit the sitemap, and compare against the baseline until the numbers settle.
What You Own, and What You Rent
Yours, in writing
- •Your brand, name and logo
- •Your domain and its registrar account
- •All your content and images
- •Your customers and their data, including form submissions
- •Exported in standard formats on request, and always if we part ways
Licensed from Araptus
- •The software that runs the site
- •Hosting, security and monitoring
- •Updates and improvements, without a rebuild bill
No vendor should be holding your domain or your customer list. That's the line we draw, and it's in the agreement.
Stuck With an Old Web Designer? Start With the Domain.
Tell us where your site and domain live today. We'll tell you what's yours, how to get it back, and what a move would cost you in rankings: ideally nothing.
Why Choose Our Web Development Services?
One Person, Start to Finish
You work with the person who builds and runs your site. No account managers, no hand-offs, no team that changes every year.
Your Domain, in Your Name
Your domain and its registrar account are yours, in writing. If it's stuck in someone else's account today, getting it back is step one.
Your Content and Data, Exportable
Your content, images, customers and form submissions belong to you. Export is a standing promise in the agreement, not a favour you have to ask for.
Your Rankings, Kept
Every old URL gets mapped and redirected before the switch, so the pages Google already ranks keep their place.
Changes Without the Runaround
Pin a note on the live page and it becomes a task. Changes go live in moments, not weeks.
Plain-English Terms
What you own and what you rent are written down in one table before you sign. No surprises when you want to leave.
Results You Can Expect
Back in Control
Domain, content and customer data in your name, not locked in a former vendor's account.
Rankings Carried Over
Redirect maps and before-and-after Search Console baselines, so a move doesn't cost you your traffic.
Updates That Happen
No waiting on an agency to find time for a headline change.
Houston-Based
Built and run from the Houston area for businesses across the metro and the Bay Area.
See What People Are Saying
Real Stories. Real Satisfaction
Built for Business Growth
From $2,999, transform your business website into a lead-generating machine.
- Proven ROI
Our business websites average 3x more leads with lightning fast performance
- Enterprise-Grade Security
Bank-level security with 99.9% uptime guarantee
- Built for Growth
Scalable solutions that grow with your business needs
- Full Service Support
From development to SEO, we handle everything
Trusted by Business Leaders
Professional Development Process
Your project deserves enterprise-grade tools and processes.
Project Management
Track every detail in Asana with real-time Slack updates. You're always in the loop.
Project Timeline
Discovery & Planning
Design & Architecture
Development & Testing
Enterprise Security
Enterprise-grade security for your peace of mind.
Quality Assurance
Multi-stage testing with Sentry production monitoring and UserSnap feedback tools.
Data-Driven Growth
Weekly tech blogs and SEO optimization based on Google Trends analytics.
Clear Communication
Daily Slack updates, weekly video calls, and a dedicated project dashboard keep you informed every step of the way.
Trusted Technologies
Industry-leading tools we use to deliver excellence.
Modern Deployment Pipeline
Araptus Highlander
Security-First. Production-Grade. Built to Last.
Security-First Infrastructure for Today's Internet
Why build from scratch when you can start with a production-grade foundation? Araptus Highlander gives you months of development work, hardened for the modern threat landscape, and ready to customize for your needs.
Enterprise Security
6-Minute Deployment
Managed Infrastructure
6-Minute Deployment
Production-ready in under 6 minutes
Enterprise Security
Production-grade protection built-in
Managed Ecosystem
Professionally managed infrastructure
Global Ready
15+ languages supported
Why Businesses Choose Highlander
- Security built into every layer
- 6-minute deployment, production-ready
- Security-first infrastructure
- Built to perform and built to last
Ready to Build Your Digital Empire?
Experience security-first infrastructure built for today's internet. Production-ready in under 6 minutes.
Frequently Asked Questions
Start with what is legally yours: your domain, your content, your images and your customer data. The domain matters most, because whoever controls it controls where your site points and where your email goes. The design and code usually belong to whoever built them, so the realistic goal is to get your domain and content out and rebuild on something you're not stuck with.
Ask the agency in writing to transfer the domain to a registrar account in your name. They'll need to unlock it and send the transfer code. If they won't respond, the registrar has a dispute process for the person or business listed as the domain's owner. We walk clients through this before anything else, because nothing else is safe until the domain is yours.
Those builders don't let you take the site with you, only the content. We copy the content, map every live URL, and rebuild. Then the domain is pointed at the new site with redirects in place, so the old pages' rankings carry over.
Not if the move is done properly. We record your Search Console and speed baselines first, redirect every old URL to its new home, and check indexing after launch. Rankings get lost when old URLs are left to 404, and that's the part we map before anything goes live.
You own your brand, your domain and its registrar account, your content and images, your customers and their data, and your revenue. On request, and always if we part ways, we export them in standard formats and help point your domain wherever you choose. The software that runs the site is licensed, the way you'd license any platform, and it stays with Araptus. That's also why it keeps getting patched and improved without you paying for a rebuild.
Often, yes. Undocumented builds are cheaper to replace than to untangle. The question to ask is what you'll own afterwards, and what happens to your rankings during the move. Get both answers in writing before you sign with anyone, including us.
Yes. Many clients are across the Houston metro and the Bay Area, from Pearland and League City to Baytown and Clear Lake. The work is done remotely, so location is never a limit.
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