New Mexico Sitting on Millions in Unclaimed Property
New Mexico is holding lost funds worth millions of dollars in the form of savings bonds and many other forms of money. These forms of New Mexico unclaimed property is more of a burden as most of these bonds have matured and stopped earning interests.
The department of state treasury of New Mexico has accepted the fact that the pile of unclaimed money over the years has increased at an alarming rate. Despite the efforts of the state agencies, there has been no improvement in the number of people showing up to claim what is rightfully theirs. However, there has been certain improvements after the introduction of certain state initiatives like the “Unclaimed Savings Bond Act” that was passed in the year 2009. This act offers support to all the state run unclaimed property programs that deal with educating masses about the importance of lost property and their burden on the state agencies.
It is because of such state initiatives, the state agencies boast of certain huge returns that they have made recently to the rightful owners. If we look at the past figures of the year 2007 to 2008, there have been returns more than $7 million to the rightful owners. With such positive results the state has introduced more of such initiatives like exhibitions and fairs that offer public assistance on a walk–in basis. Unclaimed property searches have been simplified by the state agencies with the introduction of robust techniques and state maintained databases that offer independent search options to the claimants.
The official website of Taxation and Revenue Department that is www.tax.state.nm.us, claims to be one of the best options to find unclaimed property. NAUPA, or better known as National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators, in coordination with the individual states has created an all–in–one database where data related to unclaimed property in all states can be retrieved in a single go. The state treasury feels that these steps will assist them in reducing the burden of the massive pile of lost money that has accumulated so far.
