title: Add custom text to Dropdown list for MVC 5
body: <p>I have a dropdown I want to add to my _Layout.cshtml page in MVC 5.  This is returned from Reference data in my Database - it is for CarTypes.  There are 4 different types of car model that can be selected - Saloon, 4X4, Estate and Hatchback.</p>
  
  <p>I created a CarTypesViewModel as below:</p>
  
  <pre><code> public IEnumerable&lt;SelectListItem&gt; CarTypesList { get; set; }
  
   public string SelectedCarType { get; set; }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I then have a view :</p>
  
  <pre><code>@using (Html.BeginForm("SomeAction", "SomeController", FormMethod.Get))
  {
      //Just a html div here perhaps?
      @Html.DropDownListFor(model =&gt; model.SelectedCarType, Model.CarTypesList)
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Within the layout i have the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;li id="selectedcar"&gt;@Html.Action("Index", "CarTypes")&lt;/li&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This then goes to this action in my CarTypes controller:</p>
  
  <pre><code>  var model = new CarTypesViewModel 
          {
              CarTypesList= products.Select(p =&gt; new SelectListItem
              {
                  Value = p.Id.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture),
                  Text = p.Name
              })
          };
  
          return View(model);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This is returning the data to the Dropdown list.  However what I really want is for a Value to appear like Please Select Your Car Type as the first item in the list - what is the best way to achieve that as I dont want to store that as a value in my database?</p>