Foundmoney and Edward Palonek Team Up to Remind Everyone To Check Unclaimed Property Records

July 26, 2012 - PRLog -- Unclaimed Property Laws make it mandatory for companies and institutions to hand over abandoned or unclaimed assets after a certain period of time and this differs from state to state. What one state classifies as unclaimed another may not, “so it´s important to always check these records from time to time, especially if you constantly move or someone close to you has passed away”, says Edward Palonek, founder of Foundmoney.com who has been helping individuals and companies locate such unclaimed property since 1995.

State Unclaimed Asset departments are always looking for the rightful owners of the abandoned accounts that they now have in their possession, but are not always successful. As such, millions and millions of dollars are handed over the State Unclaimed Property offices, while only a small portion of these unclaimed assets every make it back to the real owners.

The unclaimed cash that isn´t handed over to the actual owners of the accounts ends up in the State´s General Operating Funds which is then used by the governments to help pay operating expenses. This is helping all taxpayers since it keeps tax increases to a minimum. The government gets to use the unclaimed foundmoney interest free for as long as it remains with them.

A few of the latest statistics on how much gets handed over and how much gets returned can be seen in the following State Unclaimed Money Offices:
In 2011, Oklahoma issued over 12,000 checks to the owners of unclaimed assets. The largest amount ever returned in this state was a bit more that $1 million.

In 2010, Iowa reported more than $20 million in unclaimed assets and returned over $12 million of that.

In 2010/2011, California handed back $240 million to individuals and another $276.3 million to businesses.

In 2011, Texas, gave back more than $2.5 billion in cash and other valuables and returned over $165 million.

Police departments are also holding unto unclaimed property. To increase revenues, some police departments have set up auction websites to sell off items that have become unclaimed. Others such as the Baltimore Police Department have given this task to outside auction websites, to auction off all of their abandoned, stolen, lawfully seized, or unclaimed property, that is remains unclaimed for 30 days or longer.

State offices are holding unto millions of dollars of unclaimed money that they wish to hand out to the rightful owners of the accounts.  “It’s never too late to make a claim, but remember, you do not collect any interest on these unclaimed assets, so the quicker you make a claim the quicker to start to earn interest when you put the foundmoney back into your bank account.” says Palonek.

www.foundmoney.com
www.edwardpalonek.com