While farting around online today I discovered that lots of US states and some other countries such as Canada have online, searchable databases of “unclaimed funds”. This is old bank accounts that you had forgotten, or granpas insurance policy that noone knew he had etc. I am completely fascinated and have been plugging my American friends names into these sites all afternoon.
Had you heard of this before? Have you found money this way before? Are you now madly rich? Tell so that I may live vicariously through you, Ireland is a backwater with no such online source that I can find.
A company that finds this sort of thing and notifies the potential beneficiaries (for a 33% fee) notified my sister and me that our grandad had an unclaimed life insurance policy “out there somewhere”.
After not being able to find anything ourselves, we agreed to the company’s terms, and signed a contract.
Turned out to be a small amount, $6000. So me, Sis, and the company each got our 2K, and it came in handy at the time. Wish there had been a few more zeros to the left of the decimal though. That woulda’ been
I’ve found several friends and families, small amounts that they’d forgotten about, using Bank Of Canada’s Unclaimed Balances found here. . None for myself though.
I handle the unclaimed funds we hold at work, and just for this half of the state, we’ve got about $1.5M in $25 or more each, waiting for people to show up. Now, one of those is $300K, but still, there’s a lot of change sitting around waiting.
If you want to make money at it, try working as a funds locator (like JCoM dealt with). They track people down and match them to unclaimed funds, and take a substantial cut (20-50%) of whatever they are able to find.
Rather than using a search service which charges money, you may be able to search your state’s unclaimed funds registry online.
First go to your state’s website. I believe all U.S. states have websites locatable at “www.state.XX.us” where “XX” is replaced by the state postal abbreviation (i.e. “www.state.ny.us” for New York).
From there, search for either “unclaimed funds” or “escheat” (the legal term).
For instance, the NY Office of Unclaimed Funds is under the State Comptroller’s website. Unfortunately, I have no unclaimed funds on file.
Some of the state sites also called it a “Treasure Hunt” so you can try searching for that on their sites as well (I am thinking of Arkansas here). I read on the Ohio site that finders are not allowed to take more than 10% in that state, so one should probably check that out too if you go with a finder. Look yourself first though I would say, I found it really exciting, even though I was only searching for friends
Yes, I and a couple of other people I know rec’d our “unclaimed funds.” Not madly rich. I also referred the site to a friend whose deceased sister has money sitting there. The family can get it on her behalf, but they appear too lazy to fill out a few pieces of paper. Only in America?
After reading this thread, I did a few searches. I found my late uncle’s name, so I forwarded the info to my mom to pass on to my cousin (I don’t have an address for her) Hope it’s worth her while to pursue it.
I checked my name in every state where I lived, but nothing. I’m pretty good at keeping track of my money.
