The number of people who made a hardship withdrawal during the second quarter surged from the first three months of the year to 15,950, an increase of 36% from the second quarter of 2022, according to Bank of America's analysis of clients' employee benefits programs, which are comprised of more than 4 million plan participants.

It's a "pretty troubling" development if more people are resorting to making hardship withdrawals, Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst at LendingTree, told CNN.

"You understand why people do that in the heat of the moment, but the opportunity costs on that are really, really high over time," he said.