The number plate 1D was bought for a record £352,000 at auction yesterday.

Tycoon Nabil Bishara won it in fierce bidding and plans to put it on his wife’s Bentley.

His £352,411 offer beats the previous £254,000 best for a DVLA sale, set by 51NGH in 2006. The DVLA’s Damian Lawson said after the auction in Claverdon, Warks: “We’re absolutely over the moon.”

Britain’s priciest car reg is F1, bought privately for £440,625 in 2008 by Afzal Kahn of Bradford, West Yorks.

The UK’s most expensive number plate to date is the F1 registration number purchased by a British businessman for £440,625 in 2008, though that’s just small change compared to the £7m spent by Abu Dhabi-based Saeed Khouri on the 1 number plate – officially the largest sum of money ever spent on a registration number.

Even in the early days, people recognised the significance and enjoyment brought by owning a prestigious or personalised number plate and often kept them within the family for many years. Their significance is often highly personalised to their owners. Some like to have a registration that originated in their local area, some are attracted to owning their own initials and others enjoy the fun of a word based registration mark.

Number Plate Suppliers, do they have to be registered?

The short answer to the question is YES.

If you are buying a cherished plate through a registered (MIRAD) dealer who is also a registered number plate supplier (RNPS) with the DVLA then they can supply the plates for you.

Sales manager at Image Registrations Bruno Morris said “if we are supplying the cherished number to the client and transferring it onto the vehicle for them then we already have established proof of ownership and identity during the transfer procedure. It saves the customer a lot of hassle by enabling us to supply the registration plates with the completed paperwork”.

Number Plates as an alternative investment

Investing in car registration plates may seem like an unorthodox way of making money and a considerable statement in the process. Nevertheless, hundreds of investors and drivers now choose to purchase car registration plates with significant future returns available. The most obvious reason for purchasing car registration plates is to personalise your vehicle, to make you stand out from the crowd.

Even a mere decade ago, drivers with personalised registration plates were seen as wealthy and successful. In the present day, car registration plates are now more accessible and economical for the everyday working man to purchase. Drivers looking for a potential investment must keep in mind that the registration plate they purchase must be easy to sell on in the future.