The phrase "refrain from buying" is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it when you want to express not wanting to buy something. For example: "I'm trying to save money, so I'm going to refrain from buying any new clothes this month."
On a future trip, for example, refrain from buying anything, or at least anything large.
One can frequently see nudibranchs for sale at tropical marine aquarium suppliers, but please refrain from buying them despite their tempting beauty.
And then there is Germany, which itself is being tugged into a slowdown as its cash-poor southern neighbors continue to refrain from buying Audis and other high-price German goods.
Last week Congressman Eni Faleomavaega, the representative from American Samoa, welcomed Greenpeace and called for a full ban on F.A.D.'s and high-seas-pockets fishing, and asked Americans to refrain from buying any products from Chicken of the Sea or Bumble Bee.
After a fans' group wrote an open letter to the club demanding that they refrain from buying black and gay players, the Zenit St Petersburg head coach, Luciano Spalletti, today preached a message of tolerance and acceptance while alluding to the demand as "stupidity".
To refrain from buying what we want in favor of what we need.
The guests ate the food that they had prepared and refrained from buying anything.
They are delaying haircuts and refraining from buying that new computer or mattress.
I have refrained from buying jeans for the last four years because I was getting freaked out by the trendy whiskering, sanding and detailing going on.
Ruth Reichl said that she refrained from buying kids' cookbooks for her own son; she felt that he would only learn by watching someone else cook, as she had done.
Meanwhile, with little public attention, those consumers who acted responsibly, the ones who refrained from buying houses they could not afford and did not take out home equity loans to finance consumption, but instead saved their money for a rainy day, must feel like losers.
