PAWN TO BE WILD: BIZ IS SOARING IN COVID ERA
Right now people don’t have money, so they sell, says owner
Business is booming in city pawnshops, which have seen a surge in New Yorkers selling precious belongings after federal pandemic aid dried up.
Gold chains, earrings and rings, once priceless keepsakes, adorn the window of Winin’ Pawn in the Bronx, alongside used DVDs and signs in English and Spanish offering cash loans.
Behind a bulletproof barrier, Victor Vidal, who’s been a pawnbroker at the E. 149th St. shop for 21 years, said the store is bustling.
“We’ve seen maybe like 70% more business compared to January,” said Vidal. “Right now, people don’t have no money so they’re bringing in more stuff.”
Vidal said profit has gone up by 10% since federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance ended two months ago.
“Business has been picking up since September,” said Will Kim, another veteran pawnbroker at Winin’ Pawn. “We’re definitely seeing an increase in people trying to pawn things.”
Some first-time customers are pawning personal items to avoid asking their usual safety nets for help. “A lot of people, especially my family members, are barely getting by,” said Martel Johnson, 51, who’d never used a pawnshop before. “I didn’t want to put that burden on them.”
Johnson needed help paying broker fees for his upcoming move across town. He brought his laptop into Gem Pawnbrokers and got exactly what he’d hoped for it: $100. If Johnson doesn’t return within four months with $139, the computer will be repossessed.
Most pawnbrokers have known their customers for years — even generations. Donovan Webb pawned a ring for the first time, or so he thought, only to discover his name was already registered in the shop’s system. As a kid, Webb remembered, he pawned chains and rings on his mother’s behalf.
“Any option after this is the street,” Webb said. “You don’t really wanna go that route, especially if you’re doing good. I’m not doing so bad; it’s just a rough week.”
The Bronx has the highest share of pawnshops in the city, with 78 compared with 68 in Manhattan, 58 in Brooklyn, 55 in Queens, and nine in Staten Island, according to the city Consumer and Worker Protectioin Department.
Nearly one in five Bronx residents don’t have bank accounts, according to 2019 data from the department.
That’s two times higher than the average for New York City. The borough has the city’s lowest per capita income — $21,778, 2019 census data show.
“That’s not by accident,” said Anjum Hajat, an associate professor at the University of
Washington. “That’s a fundamental piece of what we are dealing with in society.”
The prevalence of fringe banking — services that charge higher-than-average interest rates — follows a long history of systemic underinvestment in communities of color, Hajat said.
Public policy experts warn against long-term consequences of fringe banking.
“If they haven’t worked the formal system, then they’re not going to be covered by the social insurance benefits that they will need as they get older,” said Ron Mincy, a professor of social policy at Columbia University, who is from the South Bronx.
Fringe loans are also associated with poor health driven by stress, according to a study conducted by Hajat’s team of epidemiologists.
Love them or hate them, pawnbrokers are fixtures in the community.
“They’re like family,” said Anna Rodriguez, who’s used Gem Pawnbrokers for nine years. Rodriguez, 40, said Gem took care of her when other pawnshops were ruthless — charging $5 each time she lost a receipt and secretly replacing diamonds with cubic zirconia. Years later, Gem’s manager stores Rodriguez’s medical documents for her, and the two even give each other presents at Christmas.
Down the road, pawnbroker Amar Dowlat looks up from counting the day’s cash. He said he’s known his customers for years. “Sometimes I take money out of my pocket to help them.”
Pawnshops, nonetheless, still have lasting financial consequences on those who use them. “If your [things] are where you’ve stored your wealth, and you lose that, it can be costly long term,” said Jim Hawkins, professor of law at the University of Houston.
Alfred Fernandez took his $600 gold chain to a pawnbroker on E. 183rd St in the Bronx. He returned with only $12 in hand — prepared to make a 2% interest payment— only to learn that he was one week late. Fernandez lost his chain for good.
“Every time I go past there, I damn near cry,” he said.