Group says Floridians are owed $48 billion in unclaimed funds

About $4.8 billion is sitting around waiting for Floridians to collect.

That’s according to Reclaim.org, a national group that works with individuals to claw back unclaimed money.

The organization, in a statement, says according to a state report published in March there are more than 13 million claimable accounts in Florida and that a state portal shows one in five Floridians has unclaimed money. 

According to the portal, FLTreasureHunt.gov, an unclaimed property is “a financial asset that is unknown or lost, or has been left inactive, unclaimed or abandoned by its owner. Unclaimed property assets are held by business or government entities (holders) for a set period of time, usually five years.”

The state gets involved when a holder can’t locate or contact the owner to return the asset. At that point, the asset is “reported and remitted” to the Florida Department of Financial Services, Division of Unclaimed Property.

Reclaim.org says Florida CFO Blaise Ingoglia returned $847 million to residents in between July 2025 and July 2026, his first year in office.

To make it easier for the state to get the money back to residents, Reclaim.org says the Legislature recently passed Senate Bill 1452. The legislation, passed unanimously, “strengthens notification requirements, adds certified-mail notices for property worth $1,000 or more and requires financial property valued at $10 or more to be listed on the state’s searchable website.”

It does not automatically return the money, though.

“Record returns are encouraging, but the billions of dollars still unclaimed show how much money has yet to reach its rightful owners,” Reclaim.org CEO Ricky Maldonado says in the statement. “The new law should make unclaimed money easier to find and notices harder to miss, but locating it is only the first step.”

Maldonado goes on to offer up his company’s services to help people understand and to prepare paperwork to process claims.

Floridian’s can also go to FLTreasureHunt.gov to check for unclaimed property and file claims.

Unclaimed Accounts

Source: Reclaim.org