The residents of the UAE are no strangers to million dollar car plates, yet everytime one is sold for more than the worth of a 6-bedroom villa …with a pool, tennis court and a water fountain carved out of a single piece of marble, set on the one of the Dubai reclaimed shores, you are in awe.
Recently, at the Emirates Auction a car registration plate bearing just the number ‘1’ fetched AED 18,000,000 dirhams which roughly equates to $ 4.9 million at auction in Sharjah.
Emirati Arif Al Zarouni was the man of the moment, (hour,week, month and probably year) who claimed this single digit number plate, whose bid was 18 times the reserve price, yet it is not the largest amount that has been paid for a registration plate in the UAE. Back in 2008, some AED 50 million or $14.2m was spent at auction for the Abu Dhabi number one plate.
Other popular numbers were 50, 100, 333, 777, 1000, 2016, 2020 and 99999 – number ’12’ sold at AED 2.07 million, while number ’22’ fetched AED 2.08 million. In total the auction made nearly $ 13.6 million.
