Many of the ads for missing money are real, but you don’t have to pay anyone to find or claim the money for you or loved ones.
When a check or other payment is returned to a business, the payer usually turns the money over to the state of the payee’s last address. The money goes into the state’s unclaimed, or escheated, property fund, which the state treasurer usually runs.
Financial firms also will turn an account over to the state when they haven’t had contact with the account holder for a period of time. Some states require a firm to turn over an account when they haven’t had some contact with the account holder during a period of time, sometimes as short as a year.
The state holds the money until it is claimed by the rightful owner or a period of time has passed. The state might hold particular assets, such as shares in a stock or mutual fund. But it might convert assets to cash.
The state generally keeps any interest or other income earned on the money or assets.
States now make it fairly easy to find and then claim the missing money. Each state has a website on which you can search for property held in the name of an individual or business.
Some even try to make it entertaining. Florida, for instance, uses the website address www.fltreasurehunt.gov.
The National Association of State Treasurers has a website of unclaimed property in all the states at www.missingmoney.com. I found the website to be cumbersome and recommend searching on the website of each state in which the person lived.
I learned about claiming missing money after taking over my parents’ finances as they aged. They were receiving letters from attorneys and accountants saying my parents had unclaimed money with the state, and these professionals could help recover it.
I assumed these were scams, but it turned out that my parents really did have missing money held by state treasurers.
I checked the unclaimed property websites of each state in which my parents resided during their adult years and found they did indeed have a meaningful amount of unclaimed property in two states.
Most of the money became “lost” when my parents moved and didn’t notify a business in time or the business didn’t receiving the forwarding notice. Some businesses try to find a customer or client who moved, while others turn money over to the state as soon as a check or mailing is returned.
Most of the money was refunds of deposits or final interest or dividend payments. But there were a few cases when they lost track of financial accounts or shares of stock held through direct deposit plans.
You don’t need to hire someone to help claim the money. You can keep all the money by following the instructions on the state’s website.
The key in most states is not to throw away all your old mail or tax returns. Part of the proof required by most states is a utility bill or official government document that has the name of the person and the address associated with the missing money.