On its face, financial hoarding doesn’t seem like such a bad thing. What’s wrong with accumulating assets? But this good behavior can easily become hoarding when taken too far. When accumulating for its own sake becomes the goal, you, or someone you know, might be crossing over into financial hoarding.
Financial Freedom in Retirement Is All About Cash Flow
Like the hoarding of physical objects, financial hoarding can get out of control because all those different accounts and pools of money become too overwhelming to deal with. Ignoring the situation only makes it worse and more difficult to untangle, but that’s exactly what people want to do. I experienced this in my own family.
“Everything you need is in the black box at the back of my closet.”
The first few times my husband’s grandfather said this to me, I stayed silent. I was an in-law, so I felt awkward about talking finances directly with him, rather than involving the rest of his family.
But then he mentioned something about stock certificates.
That’s when the alarm bells went off. I could no longer sit in awkward silence. I knew I had to act. And, because he wasn’t getting any younger, I had to act quickly.
What Is Financial Hoarding?
Being in the business I’m in, I’ve seen this scenario before. An older relative has amassed a large variety of investments and bank accounts over a lifetime, thinking that they’re following the diversification rule by spreading their wealth around. But much like squirrels in the winter, people can forget where they left this account or that stock.
