Did you know that each year millions of dollars are turned over to the Alabama State Treasurer's Office by businesses who are unable to contact the owners of the money? These funds may be in the form of cash, stocks, bonds, securities, insurance benefits, etc. Did you know that you can search the Alabama State Treasurer's Unclaimed Property Database to determine if they may be holding unclaimed assets belonging to you or your family or business?
It was like a real treasure hunt! You enter your name and press search... that is it! I have found that searching in all capital letters last name first then first initial worked the best (with no comma: MCCORMICK W)
It is almost addictive. You can enter anyone's last name and see if they are on the list! If you want to make your friends and relatives very happy, search for them and let them know that you found some missing money in their name!
If you find your name, print out the Unclaimed Property Claim Form, attach a photocopy of your identification (driver's license, etc.), and attach proof of your social security number (payroll stub, tax record, etc.). Then, you have to get it notarized (don't sign it until you are in front of a notary public: most banks have one). Then you mail it in.
There is another site called Missing Money that also looks for your unclaimed money. It searches the entire United States instead of just our state. I found that the Alabama state sight gave more information about who reported the unclaimed money and if it was for $50-100 or more than $100. From what I could see, most were for more than $100. It could be $101 or $100,000+. They do not say for security reasons. Either way, it is money that you did not know you had!
I would love to hear if you found any "missing" money!
1 comments:
True story. We received three green postcards from AL Treasury in November notifying us that we had unclaimed property. I called, thinking it was a fraud or hoax. No, the treasury said, I had some amount over $500 in my maiden name. I filed and we received a $3600 check in the mail earlier this month. Apparently when we bought our house three years ago and cashed in some stock willed to me as a baby (I think we cashed in $1000) the stock certificates had split at some point. It was a wonderful surprise considering we OWED taxes this year :(
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