Getting your Long Lost Money Back! 

Long story short, companies are required by law (after a certain time period; usually 3-5 years) to turn in unclaimed money over to the state.  This process is known as escheating to the state.  The money can vary from a last paycheck never issued or student financial aid that was never received by you.  The organization I work for escheats thousands of dollars a year to the state.  

To see if you have any money coming to you, simply go to your state comptroller's web-site and do a property search. The site will usually perform a search using your name and/or a former or current address.

If you live in Texas, the Texas comptroller web-site is: www.window.state.tx.us. The Texas comptroller web-site will have the following links to pursue your property search.   Unclaimed Property Search Online for Your Property Reclaiming Your Property

If you've lived in more than one state and don't want to do an individual search in every comptroller site, you may want to check out some unclaimed national data base web-sites that will do a national unclaimed property search for you for free.

BEWARE of companies trying to charge you money to process your claim.  There are companies sending letters to people saying they will send you a claim form for a flat fee.  Typically the form can be downloaded from the website for free.  Remember this is your money and you are entitled to it.  The only entity allowed to charge you any type of fee is the State and if the state does charge at all, it will usually be a very small fee.

I didn't find any money coming back to me, but I did do a search for my brother and family members.  My brother ended up getting close to $700 dollars back.  

Please, let me know if this advice was helpful for anyone.  Don't worry; I'm not wanting to charge a finder’s fee.  I'm just curious if anyone benefited from this advice.    

Submitted by Scott