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A recent survey by CESI Debt Solutions found a whopping 80% of us hide purchases from our partners. Ouch! Some 18.5% of married couples have credit cards their spouse don’t even know about! I’m not sure how that is possible. Wouldn’t they see the bill, notice transfers out of a bank account, or wonder where new items around the house came from?
According to the survey of more than 200 Americans, spouses are secretly buying:
- 34.5% clothing and accessories
- 24% food/dining
- 19.5% beauty/personal care items
- 16.5% gifts
- 13% alcohol
- 9% entertainment
- 9.5% music/cd/mp3
- 8.5% childcare/items for children
The last item makes me think the survey included in the “secret” category purchases not explicitly mentioned, which would inflate these numbers. The survey was conducted by a company that makes money from helping people pay down credit card debt so I suppose the more people overspend, the more their business is necessary. But forgetting to mention a purchase is different than keeping something secret. You took the kid to JC Penney for new underwear? Not exactly scintillating dinner conversation.
Most financial cheaters kept their spending on the down low to avoid problems at home, the survey found. Ya think?! Oh honey, I forgot to tell you I owe $6,000. Guess we won’t be going on vacation, after all.
- 46% are currently paying off the debt and feel s/he doesn’t need to know
- 43% want to avoid an argument
- 27% will never tell their spouse about their spending
- 19.9% are concerned it would end the relationship
- 11% plan to tell their spouse, but are not ready yet
So the question is not whether you have cheated financially on your partner, but what purchase were you hiding? Or perhaps you have a story to tell about discovering a secret purchase?
One of the biggest fights I ever had with a significant other was when I discovered he had purchased a TiVo in secret. The purchase price was not the issue, however. I was strongly against a TiVo as I was convinced I would watch too much television if we had one. He was strongly for the TiVo as it would allow him to easily record shows he liked. A great sale came up and he couldn’t resist. I found the thing in the closet about a week later and blew up – it felt like he had lied to me. Looking back, we both could have compromised and avoided the whole argument. Sigh. Live, and learn.
Welcome to Bargain Babe! I’m Mara, and I’m so glad you’re here. I am an obsessive bargain hunter and penny pincher, and I am determined to live a full life without EVER paying full price. 
OMG I am a Financial Cheater. .
My boyfriend of 4 years and I don’t live together yet but we have made some big purchases together: a laptop for him and a flat screen tv that lives at his place until we move in together. I feel like I can still hide some purchases because it’s my mine money for now, I don’t go out and purchases huge things but I can drop some serious dough on clothing and accessories. I know when we move in together I will have to come clean since we will have joint accounts for the bills and he will see all the shopping bags! I normally just don’t tell him because I don’t want to hear him nag about what I do with my money
Both my wife & I get an “allowance” that we put into our own personal checking accounts. That is, we have a joint checking account, but we each also have individual checking accounts.
Many years ago, my wife went through an exercise where she went through our bills going back an entire year & figured out all of our monthly expenses like utilities, mortgage, food, gas (even though she’s an accountant, it’s not that hard for anyone else to do). Based on that number, and our income, we decided on the amount for our personal allowance.
So now that we have our own “personal” money, we use it on stuff that’s just for ourselves. For example, if I want to play a round of golf or buy a box of cigars, I can spend that money without feeling guilty about it or trying to hide it. If she wants to go drinking with her friends, she can spend her own personal money. As our financial situation has changed over the years, of course, we’ve made adjustments to our allowance, but things that we buy for the home or the kids, we pay for out of our joint account.
One of the main causes of marital problems is disagreements and dishonesty about finances. If you want your marriage or partnership to flourish, you have to go into it with total honesty. As newly-weds, my husband and I worked out our differences. He tended to ignore bills, but felt the need to maintain control of the family finances. I needed to be sure bills were paid before any further spending took place. Eventually, I handled all the bill paying, which worked out well for both of us. When my husband was working full-time and I was only part-time, money for the big bills came from his income, and my money was used for extracurricular activities. When the situation reversed after my husband’s retirement, I paid the big bills (mortgage, insurance, etc.), and utilities and groceries came from his pension/Social Security. We had separate checking accounts, but were on each other’s accounts as a back-up. Any extra money we had in our personal accounts could be spent any way we chose. For us, this worked out very well, and we rarely had any disagreements about money, mainly because of the trust we built up between us.