So, you’ve taken the initiative to reclaim an account from the state. Aside from asking them for your money back, you’ve fought through the discomfort of sharing sensitive information to prove you are who you say you are. You gave them your current address and your phone number. Your date of birth and social security number. You even had your signature notarized – a formality with the express purpose of proving you are exactly who you say you are.
But instead of receiving a check for your money, you receive a letter from the State requiring that you show proof of your connection to the address the account was registered to. The problem is, you haven’t lived there for years. You’ve moved numerous times since and you’ve made it a point not to hold onto old papers for any longer than seems reasonable.
Now, the fate of your money lies in finding a document with your name and the old address on there. So, what now? Does the State just get to keep my money, even though you know the account is yours and you’ve proven as much thoroughly? The answer to this question, frustratingly enough, is yes, they do get to keep the money.
Asking for the seemingly impossible bears the markings of a devious tactic implemented by the State to hold an owner’s money hostage forever, or until their demands are met. Outrage is not the wrong reaction, but it won’t turn the tide in your favor either. The State’s role, as it sees itself, is as the custodian of lost money. They are tasked with the job of safeguarding your money and making sure it isn’t released to the wrong person.
There are a certain categories of unclaimed funds that may not have any affiliation with the traditional information that would identify an owner, such as social security numbers or birthdates. For instance, for assets classified as refunds - perhaps from a utility company or an insurance provider – they often stem from uncashed checks to the owners. And in these instances, the name and address at the time the check was issued may be the only points of identification the State has to reference for these types of accounts.
Of course this doesn’t lessen the frustration of being asked for something you don’t have and have no idea how you would get. Believe us, we get it. What follows are some anecdotes that arose from just this scenario and demonstrate how some out-of-the-box thinking has helped some of Fletcher’s clients find what they were looking for in some unexpected places.
1. BACK TO SCHOOL
When the NYS Legal Services Division put eyes on a claim for one Fletcher client, one of the items they insisted on having was proof of his connection to the address his uncollected dividends from an IBM stockholding had been registered to. When we relayed this to him, he was exasperated and at a total loss for how he’d come up with said proof given that he hadn’t lived there for 30 years. “Not since I was in high school”, he offered, grudgingly. After initially throwing his hands up in frustration, it dawned on him that his high school might be the key to establishing the connection. He called the main office and spoke with a secretary, and within the week he had a copy of his transcript from his senior year. And on there, was his name and the address for the home he had grown up in.
If you attended any school for any length of time, there is most likely an accessible record of it. The legal requirements for school record retention varies from state to state, from as little as 5 years in Wisconsin to a minimum of 100 years in Massachusetts. But as was the case for this client, his high school transcript became the bridge to his distant path (and to his money).
2. SOLD
When Fletcher relays the news that the State’s approval of their claim is pending on their proof of an old address, it’s not uncommon to hear something along the lines of, “I sold that house years ago”. If that happens to be the case, you’re in luck. We always recommend pulling out the closing documents from the sale, of which there is never a shortage of. The Deed of Sale, the mortgage satisfaction documents, and title insurance will all have the previous owner’s name and the address in question.
But even if you no longer have the documents from the sale of the property, the records are still accessible. In New York State, real estate conveyances are recorded by county with the respective County Clerk’s Office, or in New York City with the Register’s Office. Some have online searching options, as is the case for NYC (https://www.nyc.gov/site/finance/taxes/acris.page), but all will provide information on accessing the property records. Again, Fletcher has had scores of clients over the years satisfy their connection to an old address they had previously owned by digging up the sale and transfer documents.
3. VITAL RECORDS
But while showing proof of a previously-owned property offers a paper trail that can be picked up with relative ease, finding a link to an old rental can be much more elusive. Even in the most formal of rent arrangements featuring lengthy lease agreements and broker fees, nothing is formally recorded with a government agency to memorialize the transaction. So, when it comes time show you lived at a rental from your past, sometimes a more comprehensive memory sweep is required.
Old IDs, tax returns, employer records or paystubs are handy in the event you’re inclined to hold onto items like that. But few people do, not indefinitely. And physical paper retention is trending ever downward now that so much of our documents are digitized. One client’s creative solution to this prompted Fletcher to always ask clients if any major life events took place while they lived in the former apartment. By “major life events” we mean the birth of a child, the death of a family member or perhaps a serious medical event, all of which generate documents, and often times the rare ones we aren’t inclined to discard.
This particular client’s claim was held up on the State’s requirement to show proof of an old apartment she’d lived at in the Bronx some 17 years ago. She quickly ruled out having any of the more traditional documents in her possession, such as an old driver’s license or lease agreement. But at this time, she also happened to be helping her daughter register for her learner’s permit. In doing so, she had pulled out her birth certificate and noticed that one of the items of information on the certificate happened to be the mother’s physical address. In this case, it was the former apartment in question – where she had resided at the time of her daughter's birth.
Since then, we always encourage frustrated claimants to try and recall what may have been happening in their life at the time they resided at the old address. Sometimes, there were events that took place monumental enough to have yielded a document you wouldn’t be inclined to get rid of.
There is some power in being able to see the back-and-forth of the claim process as a game. The opponent, who also makes the rules, has an incentive to hold your money and make the process of reclaiming it difficult and discouraging. This is by design. But like any game, having an experienced player in your corner can tip the odds in your favor.