Vanity Plates in HK for a Price

Just some of the thousands of vanity plates in Hong Kong

If you want a personalised license plate in Hong Kong you need to bid for it, even if you're quite sure you're the only person who's going to want it.

I found this out through a friend of mine who absolutely adores rabbits and so she wanted the license plate "wabbit" as in Bugs Bunny.

Some license plates are just plain amusing...

She had to attend the auction when her license plate came up and (luckily) no one else wanted to compete against her to bid for it so she paid the HK$5,000 (US$640).

But what if it's a license place other people want? 

The other day the Transport Department held an auction the other day of lucky license plates after the Lunar New Year.

The ones up for grabs were:

1388

UU 88

TT 888

VV 8888

292

And one with just the letter "R", considered a lucky plate because it is related to racing cars and the first letter denoting the Year of the Rabbit, raked in a whopping HK$25 million (US$3.18 million).

It is the second-highest amount paid for vanity plates.

Other plates are strictly for the privileged...

Bidding for "R" started at the base price of HK$5,000 and several bidders soon pushed the price up to HK$2 million then HK$9 million. It was finally after 60 rounds that it was finally sold for HK$25.5 million, about 5,200 times the opening price.

Some people commenting on the news story remarked how this was a great way for the government to collect more coffers from the rich rather than further burdening the poor, while others pointed out the pandemic hasn't hurt the wealthy at all. 

The money apparently goes to charities around the city.

With other personalised plates like "God", "Wanker", "I Know", and "U Wish" hints the personalities of the car owners who wanted them -- at any price...