Aged pawn inventory: when to mark down and when to sell off

What counts as aged

There is no single industry line. The two public chains draw it differently:

• FirstCash reports the share of inventory held more than one year: 1.8% in the U.S. at the end of 2025.
• EZCORP reports aged general merchandise: 2.2% in its U.S. pawn stores at the end of fiscal 2025, or $1.2 million.

A business broker who values pawn shops for sale describes aged inventory as merchandise held at its original price beyond 90 to 120 days. PawnCounter’s reports use 120 days as the headline line, and compare each item with how long that category normally takes to sell in your shop, because 120 days is quick for a diamond ring and slow for a phone.

Turns: the number behind “aged”

Inventory turns are what you sold in a year, at cost, divided by the inventory you carried on average. FirstCash reported 2.8 turns in the U.S. for 2025; EZCORP reported 2.2 for its U.S. pawn stores in fiscal 2025, down from 2.6 the year before.

Turn it around and you get average days on the shelf: 365 ÷ 2.8 is about 130 days; 365 ÷ 2.2 is about 166 days. That is an average across everything, jewelry included. Your own days-to-sale by category is the useful version, and it is the yardstick for calling a particular item aged.

Start the clock when the item is yours to sell

A forfeit cannot go on the floor until the loan and any grace period have run out, and many states hold bought goods for a period first. For example:

• Florida holds pawned or purchased goods for 30 calendar days after the transaction, and unredeemed pledges are forfeited after the 30-day period following the maturity date (Fla. Stat. 539.001).
• Texas limits a pawn to a maturity of one month and holds pledged goods at least 30 days after maturity before the pawnbroker may take them (Tex. Fin. Code 371.160 and 371.169).

Measure age from the day the item became sellable, or every forfeit looks older than it is.

Mark down, or sell off?

Mark it down when the same kind of item has sold in your shop recently for less than you are asking. The evidence tells you the price that moves it. Drop to that price, not by a flat percentage.

Sell it off when it has sat well past its category’s normal days to sale and there is no recent sale to price it from. Wholesale it, send it to auction, scrap it if it is metal, or bundle it. The goal is the cash, not the margin you once hoped for.

Hold it when it is still inside its category’s normal window and priced in line with what sold. Not everything old is a problem; some things just sell slowly.

A rule like “20% off at 90 days” is easy to follow and often wrong: it gives away margin on items that were priced right, and does too little for items priced far above what the market pays. Price each markdown from comparable sales.

What waiting costs

Aged stock ties up cash you could lend or buy with. It also costs you when a shop is sold: the broker cited above writes that buyers discount aged inventory by 20 to 40 percent or more below its listed retail value. That is one broker’s experience, not a survey, but the direction is plain. The longer a piece sits, the less it is worth to anyone.

A weekly routine

1. Pull every item past its category’s normal days to sale.
2. Sort by cost, biggest first. The top of the list is where the cash is.
3. For each one, look for recent comparable sales in your own history. Found: mark it to that price. None: sell it off.
4. Check the list again next week. Anything marked down that still has not moved goes to the sell-off pile.

Where PawnCounter fits

This routine is what PawnCounter’s two lists do from your POS export: a sell-off list ranked by the cash tied up, and a markdown list with a price taken from what the same thing actually sold for in your shop. The free Profit X-Ray shows the top five of each; Starter gives the full lists with CSV.

Sources

1. FirstCash Holdings, Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025 (SEC EDGAR)
2. EZCORP, fourth quarter and fiscal 2025 results, Exhibit 99.1, November 13, 2025 (SEC EDGAR)
3. Stallcup Group, "Pawn shop inventory management problems buyers discover" (July 17, 2026)
4. Florida Statutes 2025, section 539.001 (Florida Pawnbroking Act)
5. Texas Finance Code, chapter 371 (Pawnshops)