Tips on Money

You may have seen the advertisements. The government is holding money, could it be yours? Unclaimed tax money is waiting; do you know if some of it could belong to you? It sounds like another scam, but quite honestly, it is possible. Many people are due missing money that they never knew was missing. This happens for a variety of reasons, but the most common reason is when someone passes away, and details are over looked.

It happened to my family. I saw that my state had a website with a database of missing money. On a whim, I put in my name. Nothing, of course. Just for fun, I started putting the names of my family members, and low and behold, my great grandmother’s name popped up. Sadly, she had passed away a few months before, but apparently, there was missing money out there with her name on it. I soon learned that my great grandmother had put down a deposit for her electric service many, many years ago. After her affairs were put in order, this was one detail that was not taken care of, apparently. I gave the information to my grandfather and they money was claimed. It wasn’t a lot, but it was her money, and it should go to someone in her family.

You may have missing money out there, and you may not know it. You may have been named in someone’s will, and were never notified. Usually this happens when you cannot be found. Don’t get too excited if you see your name pop up however, because the amount of the missing money is usually small. It’s yours though, so go ahead and take the proper steps to claim it. Another reason missing money is floating around is due to tax refunds. Believe it or not, some people forget to put in a change of address, and their tax refund checks are returned to the government. Like my great grandmother, you may have paid a deposit on a utility, and forgot to collect it when you turned off your service. You may have also forgotten about an old savings account or checking account.

There are plenty of resources out there so you can search to see if you are owed some missing money. Most of these services should be free. In most cases, your state should have a searchable database online. If someone sends you an email saying you are due some money, and then asks you to pay them for the information, ignore it. That is most likely a scam. You can find your missing money on your own.