How to Find Unclaimed Money and Inheritance

Across the US, state treasuries are holding more than $70 billion in unclaimed property — dormant bank accounts, uncashed cheques, forgotten insurance payouts, security deposits and more. A huge amount of it belongs to people who died, leaving families who never knew to look. Here's how to search, and how to keep your own estate off that list.

What counts as unclaimed property

• Dormant bank and brokerage accounts.
• Uncashed payroll, dividend or refund cheques.
• Life insurance proceeds never claimed by a beneficiary.
• Utility and rental security deposits.
• Contents of forgotten safe-deposit boxes.

How to search for unclaimed money

1. Search your state's official unclaimed-property website, plus every state you've lived in.
2. Use the national association of unclaimed-property administrators' multi-state search to cover several at once.
3. Check for unclaimed life insurance and pension benefits separately.
4. For a deceased relative, search under their name and any former names — and bring documents proving you're entitled to claim.

Why assets become unclaimed in the first place

Almost every unclaimed asset has the same root cause: a gap between what someone owned and what their family knew about. An old account is left off the estate, statements go paperless, the owner passes away, and after a period of dormancy the institution hands it to the state.

Keep your own estate off the list

The fix is the opposite of searching after the fact — it's recording everything in advance:

• Keep a complete, current inventory of every account and asset.
• Note for each one how a beneficiary would claim it.
• Make sure the right people can reach that information at the right time.
• Name beneficiaries directly on accounts and policies wherever you can.

That's precisely what a digital inheritance vault is built for — and pairing it with a will closes the loop. If you don't have a will yet, you can write one free today.