(Des Moines, IA) -- The Iowa State Treasurer's office has reunited an Iowan with a $4.5 million dollar asset that had gone unclaimed. Treasurer Roby Smith says at one point the owner bought over 15,000 shares in McDonald's Corporation.
The company deemed the property unclaimed and it was turned over to the state. Smith says the owner's last name address was in Iowa, so they sent a letter about the unclaimed funds and the woman came forward to claim, what is now the largest asset to be unclaimed and then returned to its rightful owner. The owner, who lives in central Iowa, has chosen to remain anonymous.
Top 10 Unclaimed properties:
$808,591.84 in cash, Douglas A. Lankhorst of Hawarden
$404,747.69 in cash from dividends, Gary A. Thomsen of Olin
$306.010.00 in cash from liquidation, First National Bank of Chicago/Curtis Companies Retirement Trust, Clinton, Iowa
$336,338/07 in cash, Wellmark Inc, Des Moines
$317,449.53 in cash, Janet M. Peters, Davenport
$292,411.53 in shares that were liquidated, Cedars Sinai Medical Center, Clinton
$272,065.96 in cash, Pauline C. Durgin, Urbandale
$265,220.46 in cash, Carlson Thomas Bruce, Vinton
$243,778.67 in shares liquidated, Herbert O. Stiefel, Burlington
The Treasurer's Office holds onto shares for a least one year before they can be sold, and held indefinitely for the rightful owner. Smith says the owner responded sooner so the shares and dividends accrued were returned to her.
Roby encourages Iowans to check GreatIowaTreasureHunt.gov to see if there are any assets or property that is rightfully theirs. He says those could be in the form of forgotten checking and savings accounts, stocks, uncashed checks, life insurance policies, utility refunds, and abandoned safe deposit box contents. He says the average amount is around $100.00.
He says during the last 40-years of the program, the state has returned more than $342 million to more than 934,000 individuals.
The Iowa Treasurer's Office is also encouraging those attending this year's Iowa State Fair to stop by their booth in the Varied Industries building to search names in the state's data base.
Part of the state's collection of unclaimed lock box items