Times are tight.

One way thousands of people have found the cash they need is to simply go through their old gold and broken jewelry and exchange it for cash.

"When I found the gold aluminum and I kept it for a very long time and I thought if there is a time that I needed to get some quick cash..since gold is darn expensive right now. I think it might help out quite a bit," said David Champlin.

Local Pawn Shops are seeing more customers than ever before.

"There are a lot of different customers who are having trouble paying their bills and they will do whatever they have to do to make that payment and pay that bill and often times that means coming in and selling gold," said Amy Perkins.

"We have seen a lot of increase of people coming in with gold," said Jay Henderson.

A weak economy is not the only reason for the increase of selling gold.

"A lot of divorces. Couples come in to our store to sell their old wedding sets and get some money for that," Perkins said. "Fashion trend is also one of the reasons. A lot of the women nowadays aren't wearing so much yellow gold so they sell their yellow gold and get white gold."

Gold is not the only precious item people can sell. You can earn extra cash for silver, gem stones, coins and even diamonds.

"There are many people who come to the store to sell their gold but we have customers who come to sell their diamonds and coins," said Perkins.

The price for gold is set on the world market, and can change from minute to minute, but right now sells for about $950 an ounce.