Some US economists have recently confirmed that the country is indeed in a recession. Most of us have been feeling the pinch for quite some time now and recession or not, fact is a lot of Americans are tightening their belts and have been looking for ways to save-up. If you’re a resident of Illinois (present or past), you may not have to look any further than the State Treasury Department for some extra cash. To their glee, a few people have even been getting reunited with thousands of dollars Illinois unclaimed money from financial assets they may have lost track of.
State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias’ office has returned over half a billion dollars in Illinois unclaimed money since July of 1999. Over 10 million state residents are still owed almost a billion and a half Illinois unclaimed funds right now says a report on state newspaper The Naperville Sun.
The average claim was for $200- quite a substantial amount considering its money found and not worked for. Kati Phillips, IL Treasurer spokeswoman says “We do have thousands of people who are owed thousands of dollars.” Most owners of state unclaimed property are actually unaware they’re missing money and that’s the main reason why the national unclaimed fund exceeds $30 billion right now.
Idle or dormant financial assets are required by law to be turned over to the state after a certain period (usually 5 years) and the IL Treasury Department safeguards them until the unclaimed money is returned to its rightful owners. These can be anything from old bank accounts, to unclaimed tax rebates. In fact, 153,000 IL residents have failed to file for their economic stimulus checks and run the risk of having these turned over to the state according to The Herald. The Treasurer’s office has to auction-off tangible items from safe deposit boxes every year to make way for new incoming items. He does this on E-bay and the annual Illinois unclaimed property auctions have been a success. “Not only did more than 150,000 people from all over the world look at the state’s unclaimed property on our eBay site, we sold the items – on average – at 80 percent above their appraised value,” Giannoulias reports. Auction proceeds are deemed as Illinois unclaimed money and can still be claimed by its owners.
With the current slump of the US economy, now would be as good a time as any for residents to do a search for unclaimed money in Illinois and any other state they’ve lived-in. Contrary to what most people may think, doing an on-line unclaimed funds search through multiple state databases is quite simple provided the proper methods are used.
Watch this news report on unclaimed money:
