Of course, we d all like a personal registration mark like the recently sold F1 plate but for most of us, the 440,000 pound price tag would prove a little prohibitive.
So, the trick, when searching for a private plate, is to find a good one that nobody knows exists but everyone would want if they did.
The DVLA is without doubt or exception the best value provider of UK personalised number plates there is. No one else can realistically compete because the DVLA create them all in the first place.
It is the only place you will ever find a genuine bargain.....
If you can find one, that is.
With a stock list often in excess of 30 million registrations you could spend the rest of your life trying to find words, names or phrases within it when most of the time you re not really sure what you re looking for until you see it, and when most of the number plates dont make a word, anyway.
Even if you had the time and patience for a task of this scale, the DVLA stock is in perpetual flux, selling between 500 & 1000 number plates every day with millions more being added every 6 months.
Its not that surprising then, that most people either give up the search completely or turn to one of the many privately run, after market, registration plate dealers currently operating.
Private dealers mostly offer a good service but can never offer the best value. They make their money by marking up the product which in itself wouldnt seem too unreasonable. Every business needs to make a profit, however some of the top dealers need to spend 50,000 pounds a week on advertising before they do. This money has to come from somewhere.
An example of this pricing is the registration mark: UP51ART.
I bought this registration from the DVLA for 799 pounds after finding it by default using the, then manual, Regfinder algorithm and realised I had to be on to something as it had been available on the DVLA site for nearly 3 years without anyone else noticing it.
You dont have to look very far in the private dealers advertisements to see that most 7 letter word number plates of this calibre are on sale for at least 10k.
Knowing that with the Regfinder.net system I could find thousands of such registrations I briefly thought my day job would soon be a thing of the past. But its not that simple.
I ve contacted most of the private traders regarding UP51ART over the years and been offered fixed contract prices of between 1200 and 216 pounds... Needless to say UP51ART is staying in my possession for the foreseeable future.
It could always have been worse, though... I could have bought UP51ART from one of these companies for 10,000 pounds and then been told the price they would be willing to guarantee me for it if I wanted them to sell it for me again.
All of this lead to the decision to build Regfinder.net. The number plate search engine
Now, Instead of manually trawling through the whole DVLA registration number stock with pen and paper we ve turned the idea into an algorithmic database that is updated daily for everyone to use and have found over 200,000 words and names in as many different ways possible.
To date, Regfinder.net has found, categorised, availability checked and price checked over 30 million readable registration marks starting from A at the beginning of the prefix plates up to 13 in the current style, most of which are still available or will be in the future.
Regfinder.net links you directly to your registration of choice on the DVLA website. All of the available personalised number plates found on Regfinder.net are bought directly by the user from the DVLA for the DVLA price.
Unlike all the private dealers we dont mark up the DVLA prices, nor do we receive any form of payment from the DVLA or any of the private companies.
This project was started with a Robin Hood style design remit in mind and we believe that everyone who uses this service will be so pleased, they ll tell others about it. Word of mouth will be the only advertising we will need.
About The Author
Robert Steel is a co founder of Regfinder.net, a unique and powerful
number plate search engine that has found and pre categorized as many words and names possible within the DVLA stock of cherished number plates. Once a user has found
number plates of interest they are linked straight to them on the DVLA website where they buy them direct, thus saving the cost of dealer fees.
