So I was in California for the past week and a half on vacation, and was just wondering about your license plate rules. Alot of cars, mainly nice ones, have just the paper plates with the dealer name or whatever. Is it legal there, or are they just saying f u to the cops. BTW I love the cities and climate and everything.

 

I am not sure I understand your question. You mean between the sale and when the actual license plates arrive? If so, they tape some paperwork to the front windshield until the plates come in.

If you mean after the license plates arrive and you are talking about the front plate being something other than the real license plate, then yes, people are just ignoring the law.

Thanks

 

Yeah more of the latter. Like in the license plate frame (where your California plate would go), they just have like a piece of paper or plastic proclaiming the dealership's name or something else. I saw them mainly on like the Bentleys and Rolls and the supercars and what not, but there were also some on the crappier sort of cars.

 

That's how most dealers market their dealerships. When your plates arrive the dealership plate is replaced by the California license plate. Most dealers don't put any stickers on the cars but use license plate frames as advertisement.

 

Not the actual frame, but like where the plate goes, there is no plate, just a piece of paper with an ad.

 

Yep, that would be breaking the law in California. You see a lot people running Oakland Raiders license plates on the front (because they are "hard core" haha). Sometimes you see people running a double plate up front around here with the non-license plate handing below the real one.

I have not noticed car dealership front plates on cars around here though, like what you are mentioning. I'll keep an eye out for it now though. Of course, where I live there aren't many expensive cars running around (only two Lambos and then basically a ton of Cadillac Escalades and similar truck/SUV types).

 

It was chiefly in LA and San Diego. LA on the 405 and in the Santa Monica/Bev Hills area. San Diego downtown. Only a couple in San Francisco.

 

if they were on exotics it could very well be that they werent even sold yet, the dealer driving them around as a test drive or for a show, especially if this was on the weekend, lots of exotic meets in the area you mentioned and the dealers take their cars there to get people interested in buying them