The word pawn comes from the Latin word “pignus,” which means pledge. When you think about it, this makes perfect sense. A pawn shop provides secured loans to people who in turn use personal property as collateral for the loan. The personal property is known as pawns or pledges. While you may not have given it much thought, the word pawn is rather appropriate and descriptive for the type of service pawn shops provide their customers.

Pawn shops are very helpful for people who have bad credit or are for some other reason not able to get a traditional loan. Some people simply prefer to get a loan through a pawn shop rather than getting a standard type of loan. In many ways, pawning an item is desirable to other types of loans. You can get cash right away and if you pay back your loan, you can have your item back. This way, you have an interest free loan.

If you decide you don’t want your item anymore, then you can simply allow the pawn shop to take ownership of it. The pawn shop will in turn, sell the item to their customers. Pawn shops are a great way to get rid of your unwanted things. We all have stuff laying around our house, so why not use it as a pledge for a loan or better yet, sell it to a pawn shop and walk away with some extra cash?

So, now that you know pawn means pledge, you can go to your local pawn shop with an entirely new perspective.