Today in 2018, a bidder in Delaware put up $410,000 for… a license plate.
And it isn’t the only time this has happened: there’s a whole subculture around license plates in the First State, and once in a while it can turn pretty lucrative.
In the other 49 states, license plates are, at best, something you can customize, with a word or two spelled out in a fairly short set of letters and numbers, or with a special themed set of plates.
In Delaware, there’s a real interest in the numbered plates, especially the ones with really low numbers.
License plate number one always goes to the governor.
License plate number two is for the lieutenant governor, and number three is for the secretary of state.
In the old days, politicians used to say to each other, hey support my bill or my policy and I can get you a really good license plate.
Today, drivers can make deals with each other to trade license plates from number for on up, and they can even do it for money.
There are even websites that will tell you how much your plate might be worth and they’ll list it for you!
License plate auctions don’t happen all the time, but when a plate with a really low number is available, it can bring in a lot of money.
The 2018 auction was for license plate number 20; it was being auctioned off along with the rest of someone’s estate.
The opening bid was $210,000.
The auction lasted six and a half minutes and the price nearly doubled.
Now a half a million bucks would be an extraordinary amount of money for someone to put up just to get a license plate.
But experts say that these days people usually aren’t bidding for license plate prestige.
They’re bidding on something valuable that they could then auction off themselves someday, like acquiring a piece of fine art that will appreciate over time.
A piece of fine art that you put on the back of your car to drive around.
Today in 1948, the birthday of Robert Plant.
His best known song is, of course, Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway To Heaven,” but being known for a single song can be awkward for a musician who likes to push forward and try new stuff.
Plant says once he was driving on the West Coast when he heard a nonprofit radio station asking for donations, and if they hit their goal they would never play “Stairway To Heaven” again.
He said he pulled over, called in and pledged $10,000.
I guess his head was humming and it wouldn’t go?
Delaware license plate 20 sells for $410,000 at Rehoboth Beach auction (Delmarva Now)
When Robert Plant paid a radio station $10,000 to stop playing Led Zeppelin (Far Out)
No need to put up big bucks, you can back our show on Patreon for just $1 a month
