Mobile Sports Betting Is Booming — So Is the Debt That Comes With It

“There used to be friction,” says Michael McAuliffe, president and founder of Family Credit Management, a nonprofit credit counseling organization in Chicago.

You used to have to go to an actual casino to place bets. Years ago, he’d go to Las Vegas maybe once a year with his buddies.

“We’d bet on all these different games, and sit at the sportsbook and lose two, three hundred,” he says.

The losses were there, but people had to go out of their way.

Now, you have an app (or apps) on your phone with an open line to your bank account. You can sit on your couch and make multiple bets within a single game, McAuliffe says.

“There’s a fine line between when is it just having fun and when is it actually taking over your budget,” says Ashley F. Morgan, a bankruptcy and debt attorney in Northern Virginia.

Just how much are people spending?

Both DraftKings and FanDuel have banned using credit cards to place bets. But that alone doesn’t eliminate excessive spending and debt, McAuliffe says.

Some people drain their checking and savings accounts to fund wagers, he says. Then they put necessities, like food and gas, on credit cards that carry a balance.

“They’re paying interest, often 25% or 30%, to buy their groceries because they just didn’t have any money left,” he says.

Using a credit card to buy groceries isn’t a bad idea if you do it responsibly, but leaving a balance can cost you in interest and makes it easier for debt to pile up.

But if you’ve been trying to pay off your debt for six months or longer and you haven’t seen any substantial change, then it’s time to try something else, says Morgan, the bankruptcy attorney.

McAuliffe’s credit counseling organization helps people struggling with money. He says a lot of times people just don’t realize how much they’re spending.

When he’s helping someone with addictive spending, he says he has them look at all of their statements over the past three to six months. This includes spending data in gambling apps.

It’s a sobering exercise to see how you’re spending money over and over on the same thing and not getting anything in return, he says.

Other options include contacting a nonprofit credit counseling organization like the one McAuliffe heads up.

“People come to us when they can no longer pay their bills,” he says.

Your choices become more limited when significant debt affects your entire financial life, Morgan says. This is when your car, home and wages are in jeopardy.

If you’re not struggling to pay your bills, but you do want to slow your betting scroll, we have a few tips.

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