People tend to purchase cheap private number plates or any basic number plate that appears to be fashionable. They also make a perfect personalised gift. Many people develop a passion for personalised plates. They are further driven to buy number plates as an investment.
Dealing with a private number plate:
In simple terms, private number plates are a uniquely identifiable vehicle registration mark with relevance to the owner and they replace the random set of letters and numbers that the DVLA issues to a vehicle at first registration. The costs are vastly different.
Recognised subcategories of private number plates are:
- Dateless
- Suffix
- Prefix
- New Style
What is the perfect style for a personalized number plate?
Prefix plates:
Let’s take “A5 JON” as an example. Here, the prefix that is the letter ‘A’ is selected. Then, a preferred number is taken, in this instance, it’s a ‘5’. The last part of the sequence is the last three letters, in this instance “JON”. If you are fortunate you can get your name or at least a part of your name. Here, it is JON signifying the name “JON” or “JONATHON”
New Style plates:
New or current style number plates have a format such as “AB55 AJB” and you can select your first name and surname initials at the front of the registration combined with your middle name initial as part of the 3 letter sequence at the end of the registration. Here, it is “AB” and “AJB.”
Dateless number plates:
Dateless private number plates do not have a year identifier. The prime advantage of these plates is that they can be assigned to any age of vehicle. The first dateless plate issued to a road going vehicle was “A1” issued to a vehicle registered in London in the year 1903.
You can remain anonymous: How?
Many people want to remain incognito and never display their initials or their name on their vehicle.
This approach is popular among celebrities and people of fame. A cool car can look super cool with number plates such as “O6” or “6O” which mean nothing to the owner of the vehicle. Further examples of stand-out but anonymous personalised registrations are “OO 15” and “OO II.” The most recognisable number plate would be “OO 7” as it is famous for its association with the James Bond movie character. It was sold for more than £200,000 and it is currently assigned to a Rolls Royce.
The DVLA has issued the entire O/OO/OOO registration range through the DVLA auctions. “O” is considered one of the most popular exclusive letter options. Other options that have proved popular in recent years are registered with the letters combination X/XX/XXX.
Do personalized registration number plates make a good investment?
Sales and values have been increasing over recent years. Experienced Investors are savvy about the collectible and rare or unique registrations that are most likely to increase in value. Most of these are dateless registrations with a low number of digits. These dateless plates are recognised to be the most attractive of investments.
Personalised registrations are unlike other forms of investment such as antiques, property, or works of art as they don’t require any kind of maintenance to retain their value.
Registration brokers have a significant investment in high value collectible numbers and examples of these are single letter numbers like P2, K5, 2P, 8M, 3D, 9M, 5J, etc. These are the most sought after and the most valuable combinations according to the experts. Second only to these combinations are the two-lettered single numbers like 8 MB, 9 AM, 8 JW, 8 JB, JW 8, etc.
Purchasing a number plate for another person:
In this scenario:
When purchasing as a gift it is possible to do so without the vehicle documents. The documents will be required in order to assign the registration to the recipient vehicle but initially, they aren’t required to secure your personalised number plate.
All registrations can be held on a certificate whether it is a V750 certificate of entitlement or a V778 retention document. The certificate will record the person’s name entitled to the registration and their address in combination with the registration number itself. When purchasing the registration as a gift then it will be necessary to have the name of the recipient added as the nominee.
The DVLA did charge £25 every year for certificate renewals but this is no longer the case and certificates are now valid for 10 years.