Retain/transfer old website's page rank?

[Gruber]

Hi,
I am working on this non-profit org website. Their current domain name is registered in the name of the guy who is no longer associated with the organization. The domain name is going to expire in couple of months. We have registered for a new domain name. It will be up in couple of weeks as soon as I am done working on the website.
My question is, the current website is #1 on google for a couple of search terms. What can I do to retain the high page rank after we switch over to the new domain name/new server?
Thanks.

[stymiee]

Don't change the domain name! Changing domains for a site that ranks number one is just about the worst thing you can do. Find a way to have him change the information so the organization controls it.

If you can't do that you're more or less in big trouble. You can use the following code to redirect the domain while it still works but it might already be too late for this to be successful. You'll need to add the following lines of code to a file called .htaccess and place it in the root directory of the old domain:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^(www\.)?old-domain\.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.new-domain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Once the domain expires this will no longer have any effect for you.

Changing servers does not affect rankings so don't worry about that.

[seo_expert]

Unless you have the domain name with you, there us not much you can do.

Had you transfered the old domain name in your company's name, then with 301 re-direct you can certainly re-direct the traffic and PR to your new domain. As for rankings unless the new site has the same content, it can't be maintained.

If you are planning to shift your server, then once all the files have been set-up on the new server and after making sure there are working properly, change the DNS. This way there will be no downtime between the transfer.