Character Loan

You lend money to, say, Jay Gatsby or Harry Potter or Dracula. Harry would probably be most likely to pay you back, though Dracula might have the better credit. He does have all that property in Europe.

Okay, okay...a character loan represents a loan based solely on your reputation, usually as represented by your overall credit, or predicated on a long-standing relationship with a particular bank. The loan is unsecured, meaning it's not backed by any collateral.

The lender basically just has your word that you'll pay it back. It's also sometimes called a signature loan, because all the banker really got is your signature.