Financial Hoarding?

My wife suggested this topic, since our guilty pleasure is to watch the A&E Series Hoaders. Hoarders is about obsessive-compulsive folks, who cannot throw anything out, and thus their houses become gigantic garbage tips. The inability of folks on the show to control their lives is depressing. For some reason, however, we can’t turn this show off (even though the content is so disturbing). The show rarely ends with a happy ending, which I applaud, since they are usually attempting in 3 days to “cure” someone that has been hoarding for years, which shows there are no quick fixes to this kind of problem.

Financial Hoarding?

During a brainstorming session with my wife, the topic of Financial Hoarding came to mind. Let’s wander down this topic and see whether Financial Hoarding is really a topic?

First, what can we call financial hoarding?

• I suppose a Leprechaun’s Pot of Gold is kind of a hoard, but let’s leave fantasy out of the discussion.
• You can hoard records, and keep this information compulsively for years. This is a more traditional form of hoarding. I do know folks that have credit card records from 30 years. This does seem to be a little bit obsessive.
• You can hoard money in secret bank accounts to hide money from your spouse or loved ones. I know of many folks who are guilty of this one. Is this really hoarding? It is an attempt to control things, so I think it does fit into the topic.
• You can hoard information or paper, just because it makes you feel safer. Do you really need the mutual fund reports from 1989?
• Hoarding is a control/power thing as well, so you can hoard financial decision-making as well. This would be not including your spouse in the decision-making process. Again, I have seen many folks who refuse to include their spouses in their financial decisions, a control mechanism on their part.
• You can hoard money around the house. There was a story about a home inspector who found $10,000 in a house he was inspecting. The money was hidden in the ceiling. He is to be commended because he gave it to the police, but the previous owners (elderly couple) had hidden money all over the house.
• You can hoard cheques, money orders or cash hoping to build up a big enough stash to make a purchase (I am guilty of this one). Not really hoarding, but another interesting example.

So it seems there is a case for the concept of Financial Hoarding, wonder if I could sell a different series to the A&E network?

Did I miss any possible Financial Hoarding concepts, or am I full of the stuff found in some hoarders living rooms? If Financial Hoarding is a real concept, is it a bad thing?

By the by, the most disturbing show was the guy who let rats take over his house, yikes!.