More details: Visit websiteFunflation . Slow shopping . Loud budgeting . We live in an age where there's a quippy term for seemingly every personal finance habit and trend.
While many of these phenomena affect us individually, others have a strong impact on the other people in our lives. An example of this is a rather insidious practice known as "stealth shopping."
To help stave off its negative effects, we asked a personal finance expert and a clinical psychologist to break down "stealth shopping" and share their advice for keeping it at bay.
"If you've ever bought items secretly and hid the purchase or lied about the cost of a purchase, then you've 'stealth shopped,' and it's more common than people might guess," Molly Burrets , a clinical psychologist and adjunct professor at the University of Southern California, told HuffPost.
Basically, stealth shopping is the act of concealing something you've bought from your significant other. This is different, of course, from buying gifts as a surprise or just purchasing items on your own and having autonomy over your bank account. Rather, it's intentional secrecy around bigger or recurrent purchases that affect your household.
"Stealth shopping often happens to avoid conflict about spending habits, or to spend without being judged by your partner," Burrets explained. "That judgment might be about the amount of money spent, the contents of what is purchased, or the frequency of purchases."
She noted that some people shop to relieve stress or get a dopamine boost, which can feel gratifying.
"While some people may joke about hiding purchases from their partners, the reality is that being secretive about money is never healthy for a relationship and can lead to more serious issues down the road from both a financial and romantic standpoint," said consumer finance and budgeting expert Andrea Woroch . "Stealth shopping may seem harmless in the moment, but it can be a sign of a bigger financial problem like compulsive shopping."
