INDIANAPOLIS — The ads are everywhere for a service offering to reunite Hoosiers with their money, and while it may sound like a scam, Indiana Unclaimed is a legitimate program. In fact, it’s run by a special division of the Indiana Attorney General’s Office.
Each year, leaders run a series of ads to get people to simply check out the list for their name or someone they know. The money adds up: $500 million is being held by the state just waiting for the right person to come forward.
One of the ads is a newspaper insert spanning 27 pages worth of names. Some may surprise you — like the Indiana Department of Revenue — but most are people like Melody Statzer's late husband.
“I just happened to see my husband’s name on it, so I went to the website,” Statzer said.
He had a love for fishing and shared his passion with others.
“My husband had sold a fishing lure on something, and I didn’t know he had done it," Statzer said. "One of the boys said, 'Dad sold this, and the money's out there.' I didn’t know he had a PayPal account, so it just went out there unclaimed."
Ten years later, the money finally found its way back home.
“I took myself and our fur baby to Dairy Queen,” she said. “He’s been gone over 11 years, and I still find little things around the house that I know he’s been responsible for, so I can’t help but think this is his way of saying, 'here you go, babe. I’m thinking of you.'”
Indiana Unclaimed officials said Statzer's story is similar to thousands of others. Eligible descendants can file a claim for money or property belonging to a deceased loved one.
"It was very, very easy to go through their website and follow all the prompts," Statzer said. "I really figured that since it was over 10 years, I would run into a lot of red tape, but they made it so easy."
So far this year, Indiana Unclaimed has returned more than $34 million — or an average of $1 million a week.
The unclaimed items include:
- Wages or commissions
- Savings and checking account money
- Stock dividends
- Insurance proceeds
- Underlying shares
- Customer deposits and overpayments
- Certificate of Deposits
- Refunds
- Credit balances
- Money orders
- Safe deposit contents unsuccessfully claimed by a person or family
Click here to check the list of people who are owed money.