Historic Plates.com.au

SA '4's recent sale sets a high water mark for plates in SA.

(21.11.12, updated below)

The collectable Historic Plate market in SA was abuzz on
Thursday 3rd October  2012, when a small
advertisement consisting of text only appeared in the Financial pages of The Advertiser .

Why? The interstate living centenarian long-term custodian of plate SA ‘4’ had
decided to offer the plate for sale through an Adelaide accountancy firm.

The fourth plate ever issued in SA and today the second
lowest plate on issue with Rights after  SA ‘3’, the family acquired the Rights to
their grandfather’s  number sometime
after 1985’s The Great Plate Auction^TM , when Rights to Historic
Plates were first offered by the SA Government.

At Historic Plates we’d heard of the existence of a fifth
single digit plate some years ago, thus making the total of single digit plates
in SA five, being  SA ‘3’, SA ‘4’, SA
‘6’, SA ‘7’ and SA ‘9’.

Since c. 1960 SA '4' had been registered to the original
family's Daimler SP250 "Dart", an English sports car with a V8 engine.
We belive the plate remained on this car right up to it's recent sale.

The Advertiser called us at Historciplates.com.au for some
background on the  plate and  it’s potential value on Thursday 3^rd  October, 
and they  published an  article in their paper the following day.

In the intervening weeks we received several enquiries from existing
and new customers, all whom were considering placing an offer through the
advertised tender process.

We trust in some small way we helped all our clients as is
always our aim, and  we were recently pleased
to be advised by a valued client that he had secured the rights to this, the
first single digit plate to come on  the
open  market since SA ‘7’ was offered for
tender by the SA Government  in 1993.

Congratulations to the new owner, the plate’s second in the past
106 years. It has been secured away from view for some years of late, however
you may have to wait a short while before you see it on the streets, as the new
owner has no immediate plans to register it on a car. I’m sure this will be
hard to resist and the new custodian will bolt it to a car soon.

I for one look forward to that day.

Bravo, and well done to the new owner.

Thus, the SA Historic Plate market is strong for the rare and exclusive
plates, the one off special and rare plates that come onto the market only once
in several lifetimes.

So for those clients who missed out on the 2^nd
lowest plate on issue, come along to The
Great Plate Auction IV and bid on the 12^th and 13^th
lowest plates ever issued, SA ‘21’ and ‘22’, and are infact the lowest p-a-i-r  in a single ownership on issu in SA.

Here is a vintage article we held back publishing for such an occasion- enjoy the read.

UPDATE: our client contacted us having read this page to advise that we were right- he couldn't resist registering 'ol SA '4' on one of his favourite cars. He has most generously sent us some images of the plate on his car; here it is registered on the first new car to receive the number since 1960.

Sincere thanks for granting permission to share these images with all our plate enthusiasts!