Sometimes you need a little extra cash and it’s not a big deal. In fact, just about everyone runs into this situation at some point and it’s completely normal so don’t stress about it. If you are looking for something to pawn, have you considered your cell phone?
The fact is that a lot of pawn shop these days are taking in cell phones for pawn loans because of how valuable they’ve become ever since the advent of the ‘Smart Phone.’
Now, I already know what you might be thinking – how can you ever live for days or maybe even weeks without your phone?
I get it, I understand the separation anxiety but the truth of the matter is that sometimes you just need to do what you need to do to get things done and live life.
Sadly that’s just the nature of our society and when you have an emergency expense come up, or an unexpected bill appear out of nowhere, what else are you supposed to do? You’ve got to take care of these things and it’s completely understandable to sometimes do without for a little bit to take care of the responsibilities that you have in front of you.
So with that in mind, now that we understand that you might just have to pawn your cell phone for a little bit to make ends meet, let’s talk about how exactly you should go about doing that to get the most money out of it possible.
The more desirable your phone is the more likely that you will be able to pawn it for a good amount of money with your local pawn shop.
Cell Phone Pawning Tips
Okay, when it comes to pawning something there are some basic rules that apply to just about every type of item out there no matter what it is.
Things that matter are:
The Brand Name
The Model
How Current It Is
The Condition
The Completeness
The Demand For That Item
Understanding those things are important because they will guide you through the rest of the process of preparing your phone to be pawned for the first time.
The Brand Name/Model – You can’t do much about this. Whatever your phone is is what it is and hopefully it’s something that the pawn shop will find value in. That having been said, if the phone is within a few years old and particularly if it’s a smart phone there is a good chance that a pawn shop will be able to work with you on it to make a loan and get you the money you need.
The Condition – Okay, this is something that you can do something about and to be honest, you should!
When you take something to a pawn shop the pawn broker is going to look the item over to see what kind of condition it’s in. Obviously if you take the some nasty, dirty, marked up old phone then they won’t be all that excited to loan you a lot of money against it.
If however you take them a phone that is in very good condition and looks like it could be sold right there on the spot, the pawn broker is going to be much more interested in working with you on it and will probably pay you more than if you hadn’t cleaned the phone up.
So what I’m getting at is that it’s worth spending a few minutes to wipe down your phone. Don’t dunk it in a bowl of water of anything but spray a little window on a paper towel and just wipe down any heavy marks. The goal is to make it looks as new as possible.
Of course there are going to be some marks that you won’t be able to do anything about and that’s completely understandable but you should at least try to remove what you can so that you are presenting it in it’s best possible light.
The Completeness – Okay, here again, this is completely under your control and you can seriously put the odds in your favor just by making sure that you have at least the basics with you when you go to pawn your cell phone.
For instance, there’s absolutely no reason not to take the cord and wall charger with you. Those are an absolute minimum and most pawn shops will expect you to bring them with you if you want to make a loan on your cell or sell it to them.
That having been said, not everyone keeps the original box and that’s okay. However, if you are one of those people and you have the original packaging materials then you should definitely take them with you. The pawn shop may feel that they make the phone easier to sell and therefore will give you more money for the phone than if you had not had them.
With these tips in mind you should find that pawning your phone is a pretty easy process and you shouldn’t have a problem working with your local pawn broker on making a loan to get the money you need to cover whatever bills have come up.
