How to protect your money when you’re married to a gambling addict

By Jeanne Sahadi, CNN

(CNN) — No matter how much they may love their families, gambling addicts can pose direct financial harm to them.

That harm might range from never repaying loans to stealing their spouse’s and children’s identities to access more credit. It could involve emptying joint bank accounts and college funds, or tapping home equity. It could mean getting into trouble with the IRS and facing the prospect of wage garnishment or property liens. Or it could lead to stealing money at work to pay gambling debts and then losing their job, reducing the family’s income.

Whatever the scenario, it’s often the problem gamblers’ spouses who try to remedy the damage to the family finances, as well as prevent future financial abuse of themselves and their kids.

While problem gambling is not new, it could become more prevalent. Ever since the Supreme Court struck down in 2018 a federal ban on state-authorized betting, which paved the way for the legalization of online sports betting sites, the opportunities to gamble now range from casinos to the phone in your pocket. As of last year, 38 states and Washington, DC, had operational sportsbooks. Total sports wagers rose from $4.9 billion in 2017 to $121.1 billion in 2023, with the vast majority (94%) placed online, according to a study published this year by researchers at the University of California at San Diego.

The researchers analyzed online search trends for queries related to help for gambling addiction both before and after the Supreme Court decision. They found a 23% increase in national searches since that decision, with “pronounced increases in states that introduced online sportsbooks.”

That tracks with the experience of a group called GamFin, which offers no-cost financial counseling to those who have a gambling addiction as well as to their loved ones affected by it. Case loads rose “pretty tremendously” after the 2018 decision, said Janice Pierce, a certified financial planner who leads GamFin’s financial counseling practice.

Realizing the problem

What often brings spouses of gamblers into counseling — with or without their partner — is a big, upsetting shock. “Something happens where the gambling has been revealed. Often, it’s a massive amount of debt,” said Axton Betz-Hamilton, an identity theft expert and an accredited financial counselor at GamFin.

The shock may come when the spouse opens a piece of mail or gets a phone call about an account in collection that is in their name or their child’s name.

And the disbelief may be especially pronounced when the partner with the gambling problem has been the one managing the family’s finances, Betz-Hamilton noted. “So, the spouse doesn’t know what has been happening.”

What spouses might choose to do

The specific steps that partners of compulsive gamblers might take to mitigate and prevent financial damage will depend on their family’s circumstances. And it may depend on whether the gambler has acknowledged causing the harm and is cooperating with efforts to rectify the situation.

But financial counselors like Pierce and Betz-Hamilton often recommend clients consider the following steps among others:

Freeze your credit and your children’s credit: While it can’t undo harm already done, it will prevent anyone from taking out credit in your or your children’s names.

It also might be a good idea for other family members to do the same if there is any chance the problem gambler has access to their Social Security numbers, Pierce said.

Freezing your own credit is free and pretty straightforward. You just need to create an account at each of the three major credit reporting bureaus — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

It requires a little more work to do so for your minor children, because you have to provide proof of your relationship to them.

If at any point you want to apply for credit for yourself, you can always temporarily lift the freeze and then reinstate it, Betz-Hamilton said.

Go through your credit report: If a spouse discovers that their identity was stolen or that their partner has failed to pay taxes or other bills with both their names on them, it’s worth finding out what other accounts or loans might be adversely affected.

Betz-Hamilton and Pierce recommend reviewing your credit reports from the three major bureaus — all of which can be obtained for free once a year at annualcreditreport.com. Then report all incorrect information — from addresses and phone numbers to accounts you never opened or loans you never took.

File a police report: You can contest any fraudulent account on your credit report and fill out a consumer statement explaining your situation. But creditors may not believe you if you haven’t also filed a police report naming your spouse as the person who stole your identity.

“The stumbling block a lot of clients have if there’s been identity theft (is that) in the eyes of some creditors, you’re not a victim without a police report,” Betz-Hamilton said. But, she added, a lot of spouses are not willing to file the report.

In that case, and especially if the gambling spouse is not cooperating with efforts to get the family back on track financially, she will then work with the client to help them figure out how they then can tackle the debt that has been racked up in their name.

Put guardrails around money access: Spouses should assume the role of family financial manager and bill payer, at least until their partner is far along in their recovery.

One step to take is to restrict how much access their partner has to family funds and assets, Betz-Hamilton said. One immediate way to do this is to change the online passwords to bank accounts so only the non-gambling spouse knows them. Another might be to keep things like valuable jewelry and car titles locked up and out of reach.

Then set limits on how much money your gambling partner has access to daily or weekly — perhaps putting just enough on a prepaid card to cover the costs of getting to and from work and buying lunch, Betz-Hamilton said. That way, it’s up to the gambler to decide how they deploy those funds. “If they use it to gamble, it’s gone,” she said. “And they have to sit with the consequences of that.”

Another option if the partner has taken money from a joint account or fraudulently accrued debt in a spouse’s name is to redirect some or all of that person’s paycheck into the non-gambling spouse’s personal account until the debt has been repaid. Since payroll services won’t automatically deposit one person’s paycheck into another person’s account, Pierce noted, you can ask your bank set up an automatic sweep to remove funds from your joint account into your personal account as soon as the money is paid.

Where to get free help

Those who suspect or know they have a gambling problem, and their partners and families, can access any number of free resources and services for help sorting out the emotional and financial fallout of a gambling addiction.

One is the National Problem Gambling Helpline (1-800-522-4700).

There is Gamblers Anonymous for those seeking to get a handle on their addiction. It has state-specific hotlines, which you can find here.

GamFin offers financial counseling, including help with budgeting and paying down debt, to anyone from a family in which one member has a gambling addiction.

And then there is Gam-Anon (718-352-1671), a 12-step self-help program offering meetings and resources for loved ones of gambling addicts, who can join regardless of whether the compulsive gambler in their lives is trying to stop gambling or even admits they have a problem.

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