subject: How To Find Money Held By The State And Other Missing Funds For Finder's Fees [print this page] If you're wondering how to find money held by the state, you're probably considering getting involved in the "found money" business. Becoming a money finder is fairly easy, and using a few legal loopholes, you can make some nice income reconnecting people with their lost funds. Here's how to find money held by the state, and other unclaimed funds.
First, check your state's website. You'll likely find a link there to the state's unclaimed funds "treasure hunt." This is a website where you can type in your name, and find out if you have any missing money that is due back to you. If your state doesn't have a link to this type of website, look for a state agency called "Division of Unclaimed Funds," or something similar, and contact that agency to find out how to access or get a copy of their list of unclaimed funds.
Learning how to find money held by the state is easy; thus, a lot of money finders work these funds, which are usually from old forgotten savings accounts, uncashed stock dividends, and unreturned utility deposits. Since these funds don't usually amount to much, and most states limit finder's fees on these funds to 10%, you'll have to focus only on large amounts if you want to make any real money.
The best funds to focus on are real estate overages. A legal loophole exempts most of these funds from being subject to finder's fee laws, so you can charge whatever percentage of these funds you feel comfortable with (not more than 50% is generally a reasonable fee). And since these funds aren't advertised publicly like the state funds mentioned above, there are far fewer money finders working them.
You'll find a lot of big real estate overages in the $10,000-$50,000 range. These stem from mortgage foreclosure and tax foreclosure - and with the skyrocketing rate of foreclosure in the current economy, there are a lot of them. If you can find records of these funds, and then locate their owners and convince them to allow you to assist in the recovery of the funds while keeping the source of the funds a mystery, you stand to make thousands of dollars per case.
Because these owners might never become aware of their missing funds otherwise, money finding is really a great career to get into, and there's never been a time like the present to start.
