Have You Checked New York State Unclaimed Funds Recently?

I get excited whenever I hear about unclaimed funds. I'm thinking, did some long-lost relative leave me money that I don't know about that is sitting in an account with New York State?

And then I think about home much money there could be if my name was attached to an unclaimed fund account. Unfortunately, whenever I check by typing in my name, it comes up empty.

New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli's website features a section for check-in unclaimed funds for residents of New York State. It states that in the year 2021, just under $406 million dollars was returned from unclaimed funds. Each day about $1.5 million dollars is returned to state residents who file.

That's a lot of dough. It's quite easy to check. Visit the New York State Comptroller's website, click on 'Unclaimed Funds', and fill out the simple form. You can even report unclaimed funds.

I checked just how much money is waiting to be claimed in some Southern Tier counties, and here's what I found in terms of the number of unclaimed accounts and total unclaimed funds as of December 2022:

• Broome County - # of accounts - 71,901 - $31,467,741.
• Chenango County - # of accounts - 14,236 - $5,820,047.
• Cortland County - # of accounts - 13,496 - $5,235,939
• Delaware County - # of accounts - 12,733 - $5,959,441.
• Tioga County - # of accounts - 15,593 - $4,978,540.

The New York State county with the most amount of unclaimed funds is no surprise. It's New York County which is the county where Manhattan resides, with a number of accounts at 2,068,720 and a total of unclaimed funds of $ 2,319,268,500.

The county with the most unclaimed funds in Upstate New York is Erie County, home of Buffalo at 327,177 accounts totaling $172,253,584.

[via New York State Comptroller's Office]