How to Hide Money and Escape from Abusive Partners

To break free from a horrible situation such as living with a controlling abuser involves careful planning and resources and finding some creative ways of hiding money and other resources that one can use when forced to escape a potentially dangerous situation which might also involve domestic violence.

The plan in escaping an abusive relationship includes having a safe destination, where obviously, you will not be found and can start a new life. The resources come down to compiling a list of all the things you need to have in place along with good trustworthy people who can assist you, and money to make your escape finally happen.

Chances are, that you can imagine a place where you would rather be and never be found by your abuser. A place where you can find a way to sustain yourself and family economically, without having to worry about abuse anymore. Maybe somewhere at the opposite coast, or even another country.

Hopefull there is at least one person that you can trust, who you can count on to help you with your plan -- someone who your abusive spouse will never suspect.

To eventually carry out your escape will depend on having enough cash money to carry it out. Relying on your credit cards or your own bank ATM cards will be too risky, as you can easily be traced by the paper trail you would leave.

The challenge is to find ways to hide your money, so that there is no trail leading to you, and also hiding it in such a way that your abuser will not find it. The latter is imperative, as your physical safety depends on not arousing suspicion that may put you at risk of even more physical danger.

How to Hide Money 

Find one person you can trust. Once you decide on who you can trust the most to help you, do not tell another soul. This is especially important because of the emotional nature of your situation.

People, especially family members may be encouraged to talk to others about your critically important plans, which risk getting back to your abuser. Sometimes another woman who has been abused might be an ally in this situation.

Open a bank account in another person's name. Once you find a trustworthy friend, get them to open a bank account in their name. This is the most important step. You will now have access to the safest hiding place of all for your money.

But, do take care not to leave the ATM card or bankbook around your home where it can be found by your abusive husband! Better to find an off-residence hiding place, where these documents can be placed safely in a zip lock freezer bag and hidden.

Your friend can also get a safety deposit box to hide valuables or even more money. Although you're technically not supposed to, these are extenuating circumstances.

Get your employer to help. If your employer is someone who can be trusted, they can cash some of your checks for you or provide you an advance on your pay.

Cash your checks so they are untraceable. If you get paid by check, you can get them cashed at one of those instant check cashing places, usually for a nominal fee around 3% or so. The good thing here is that its untraceable.

Then all you have to do is to hide the cash. It might be a good idea to hide some physical paper money as a backup to the main plan of hiding the bulk of it in a friend's bank account.

Use pre-paid debit cards or VISA gift cards. One place to safely put your money is to purchase one of these cards with cash and find a safe place offsite to hide it, such as a trusted friend or relative.

Get a passive income going. Find ways to create multiple streams of income, however small they may be. Creating a website about your experiences could be monetized by putting ads or something like that. Although the payout is small, every little bit helps. But be careful to do this from your home computer, where he would have access.

Online Anonymity. TailsOS is a free and open source Linux-based OS that runs on a USB flash drive and uses the Tor protocol network to protect your online identity and avoid censorship when transfering your data and identity. It is widely used and supported for activism, journalism, and political dissidents.

It would be a very good idea that anytime you are doing something you don't want your snoopy abuser to see to use TailsOS. You will be invisible and untraceable by them, leaving no trace in any system logs and so on. You can access email accounts that your abuser does not know about, creating them through TailsOS and then only ever accessing it and any other sensitive accounts through it.

Cover your tracks. Do not talk about your plans from home. I have heard of numerous cases where insanely jealous husbands have tapped their wives phone calls and used keyloggers to record every keystroke on their computers. With all the spy gadgets, it is very good practice to act as if there are hidden cameras recording you with both video and audio on.

So, even talking to your friends on some hidden instant messenger account is too risky. Talk to your trusted person face-to-face and in public, say a shopping mall food court. Arrange clandestine meetings with them.

Learn ways to communicate with people discretely. Learn how to use anonymous mail forwarding services. Use anonymous privacy tools such as document editors, email services, cloud storage, private messengers and more that cannot be traced. Use the public library's computers to email people and work on your websites.

Rent a private storage locker. One of the best things to do is to rent a storage locker in a public storage place, or get a friend to rent one for you. You can even get a trusted friend to stash stuff in it for you. You can smuggle items out bit by bit in a trackbag or backpack and make it look like you are off to the gym.

Plan your escape when you get big money from several income sources at once. For example, at tax time, you might be eligible for a few thousand dollars in tax rebates and also be getting a paycheck. This could be the ideal time to fly the coop! 

Run up some cash advances on your credit cards a few days before your escape. Even something like buying a 100 dollar gift certificate with your credit card, and then buying a dollar item with it and pocketing the cash might help get you some extra bucks.

Plan carefully! In most cases this escape plan will involve discipline and careful planning on your part. It may be that it could take 6-9 months of saving and socking away money, and to give you the time to plan your destination.

See also: 60 Places to Hide Valuables and How to Live on the Run

Take advantage of as many resources online to help you, from counseling, to women's shelters and so on, remembering to be very careful when accessing these resources from your home, using the above methods to cloak your online activity.

But most of all, rely on yourself - you are all that you have. Trust your instincts and break free; you deserve better!