Sell to Us · Old Pawn
Old pawn is the good stuff, and the melt counter cannot see why.
Old pawn is a phrase collectors use with real reverence, and most families who own a piece of it never know they do. At the reservation trading posts, silver and turquoise jewelry was pawned for goods and credit, and when it went unredeemed it became dead pawn and was eventually sold. The pieces that survive carry the wear, the ingot silver, and the honest age that the collector market pays the most for. A scrap buyer sees an old scratched cuff. A specialist sees the era.
We buy old pawn the way it deserves to be bought, reading the silver, the stampwork, the stone, and the wear rather than pricing it by the gram. We are the team behind Old 44 Vintage, buying across Southern California in person, and this is some of our favorite material to handle. We explain what makes a piece old pawn rather than tourist work, and we pay cash the same visit.
What makes old pawn worth it
Ingot and early silver
Silver melted and worked by hand rather than cut from sheet, with the weight and irregularity that come with it. A core tell of a genuinely old piece.
Honest wear
Softened stampwork, a warm patina, and contact wear where a piece rode against a wrist or a chest for decades. On old pawn this is value, not damage, and it should never be polished away.
Natural stone
The turquoise in old pawn is usually natural and often from mines long since closed. Depth, matrix, and color are read in person, since the stone frequently carries most of the value.
Trading post and Fred Harvey era work
We separate heavy reservation pieces from the lighter tourist silver of the Fred Harvey railroad era, and price each honestly for what it is.
Do not clean it before we see it
The single most expensive thing you can do to an old pawn piece is polish it. That warm dark patina in the recesses of the stampwork is part of what collectors pay for, and a bright shine erases decades of age in an afternoon. Leave it exactly as it is, keep any old pawn tags or tickets with it since those add to the story, and send photos to (949) 449-1255 including the backs and any hallmarks. We will tell you the same day whether it reads as old pawn or later tourist work, and what a fair number looks like.
Our Word
One phone call is the whole process. A real person answers, we come to you, and you decide with a cash offer in hand.
How it works
Call us.
A real conversation about what you have, no forms, no waiting.
We come to you.
We look at everything, at your pace. We know what we're seeing.
Cash offer, same visit.
A fair price on the spot, or a full estate sale run for you.
Common questions
What does old pawn actually mean?
It refers to jewelry pawned at the reservation trading posts, often decades ago, which the collector market prizes for its age and authenticity. Strictly it means a piece that once sat in pawn, but the trade uses it more broadly for genuinely old, worn, handmade Native American silver.
Should I polish or repair my pieces before selling?
Please do not. Patina and honest wear are part of the value on old pawn, and polishing or amateur repair usually costs more than it adds. Bring it as it is, original stones and all, and let us read it before anyone changes a thing.
How do you price old pawn?
Piece by piece, out loud: age, silverwork, stone, wear, and any hallmark, priced against the collector market that actually wants it. That is a very different exercise from weighing it, and it is the reason old pawn should never be sold as scrap.
Know what it’s worth before you sell.
Our field guides explain how the market actually prices these things. No fishing, no hype: real ranges and the details that move them.
One call. We’ll take it
from there.
(949) 449-1255Mon-Sat 6 am-8 pm · Sun 8 am-5 pm
A real person answers, Monday through Saturday. Photos sent today are usually answered the same day.
Prefer photos? Text them straight to the same number · or send them here
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