Why Older LGBTQ Adults May Be More Vulnerable to Fraud

Romance scams in general are on the rise, and victims are losing far more money on average, according to the FBI. The bureau received 24,299 reports of romance scams in 2021, a 25 percent increase from two years earlier, with losses jumping from $475 million to $956 million in that period. Nearly half of victims — 48 percent — are over 50.

More isolated, wary of authorities

In a newly released AARP survey of 2,004 LGBTQ Americans 45 and older, 8 in 10 said they are not sure they will have adequate family or social supports in their later years. And more than half of respondents (52 percent) said they felt left out, lacked companionship or felt lonely.

By comparison, only about a quarter of the broader 50-plus population reported feeling lonely in an October 2020 study of social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic conducted for the AARP Foundation and the United Health Foundation.

Many older LGBTQ people are estranged from their biological families so lack a traditional source of caregiving support that many older adults rely on. They are twice as likely to live alone and four times less likely to have children than average, according to SAGE, and often have experience of discrimination that can make them less likely to reach out to senior centers, meal programs and other support services.

As a result, they might not feel welcome in some areas of the country where “aging communities aren’t as receptive” to LGBTQ people, says Ronald Long, director of Elder Care Initiatives at Wells Fargo, which has teamed with SAGE on efforts to address financial stress in the older LGBTQ population.

“Such communities offer a layer of protection from the isolation that scammers often seek,” Long says. “But when you are put in a position of being an outcast, actually unaccepted, by the very folks who could keep an eye on a potential scam situation, you are more vulnerable.”

Older LGBTQ Americans might also not feel as though they can turn to the authorities to report fraud. Many in the community came of age in a time when homosexuality was illegal, Herndon says, “so law enforcement was not who you went to if there was a problem.”

And isolation is closely tied to loneliness, fueling a desire for connection that can lead many to seek out companionship on social media and dating apps, where scams flourish. “The scammers know that there’s an epidemic of loneliness and they’re exploiting that,” says Samuel Levine, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.

Financial insecurity

In a 2014 SAGE survey of single adults ages 45 to 75, about half of those who identified as LGBTQ said they’d need to continue to work beyond retirement age, compared to 27 percent of non-LGBTQ adults.

Women in same-sex relationships are at particular risk of financial hardship: Those ages 65 and older have nearly twice the poverty rate of older married opposite-sex couples, according to an in-depth report from MAP and another think tank, the Center for American Progress, on the financial status of LGBTQ women.

One big reason for such disparities: Until 2015, same-sex couples did not have a nationwide, constitutional right to marry, which is associated with greater financial stability (among other factors, it comes with tax and insurance benefits). It was another five years before the Supreme Court ruled that civil rights legislation protecting people from sex discrimination in the workplace applied to gay, lesbian and transgender workers.

Money problems can put someone at higher risk for fraud, Herndon says. For example, potential discrimination against LGBTQ Americans in the financial services industry could lead them to seek out riskier funding sources. “You can imagine that if you were denied a loan, you might resort to some other tactics to get a loan, which might have put you in front of a fraudster,” he says.

To help address this risk, SAGE worked with LifeCents, a company that develops digital financial-wellness tools, and the Wells Fargo Foundation to create SAGECents, a free app and website designed to boost older LGBTQ adults’ financial literacy and health.

With SAGECents, users can track their spending and access information on current scams, how to report them and where to find support if they are targeted by a criminal. 

Older LGBTQ people “oftentimes are convinced that authorities won’t believe them,” says Vincent, of SAGE. “Consequently, they feel like they have nowhere else to turn.”

But the FTC’s Levine emphasizes how important it is for LGBTQ scam victims to report these crimes.

“One of the points of Pride month is that we are more powerful if we are proud,” says Levine, who identifies as LGBTQ himself. “I would say the same thing about fraud. If we are open about what happens to us, we are more powerful to combat it.”