Unclaimed property is a property or accounts within financial institutions or companies where the owner of the property cannot be found or there has been no activity which is generated regarding the property for one year or a longer period.
After the dormancy period, if there’s no activity or contact, the property will be ‘unclaimed’ and turned over to the government. If the owner of the property wants to claim it back, he/she should file a claim. Sure, to claim the property, the owner can do it through the Unclaimed Property Department where your property was expropriated.
So, if you have an unclaimed property managed by CENLAR FSB, of course, you should find what department allows you to claim your property. Well, one of the unclaimed property departments which issues the unclaimed property reported by CENLAR is California State Controller (CSC). Let’s find out more information about CSC in our post below!
How Does California State Controller Work?
California State Controller will allow you to claim your property which has changed its status to unclaimed property. However, California’s Unclaimed Property Law will require banks, corporations, insurance companies and certain other entities to report and submit their customer’s property to the State Controller’s Office if there has been no activity for at least three years.
Moreover, the common types of unclaimed property are stocks, bank accounts, uncashed checks, bonds, wages, insurance benefits and safe deposit box contents. In this case, the California State Controller, Betty T. Yee will keep the lost or forgotten properties as long as it takes to reunite it with the rightful owners.
The good news, there’s no deadline to claim the lost of forgotten property after it is transferred over to the State Controller’s Office. Sure, it’s easy to find out if the Controller protects your property in your name.
Claiming Your Property Back with California State Controller
If you want to claim your property with CSC, make sure to search your property through the Unclaimed Property Search page here. This page will allow you to find your Unclaimed property which already has been sent to the State for safekeeping, as well as the property which is about to be sent to the State by a business as required by a law.
- To start your search, you should choose an option either Individual Owner Search, Business/ Government Search or Property ID Search.
- Choose the ‘Individual Owner Search’ if you are an owner who is looking for your unclaimed property.
- Once you choose an option, you can then enter your last name, business name or property ID in the search field. Then, click on the ‘Search’ button after all fields are filled.
- After you click on the ‘Search’ button, the California State Controller’s database will search for the property which is associated with the information provided.
Note:
- If a match or multiple matches exist, the CSC’s system will show any matches.
- If you search results in greater than 500 matches, only the first 500 matches will be displayed.
Alternatively, you can narrow your search by adding your first name, middle initial or city of your residence. Certainly, accounts with more than one name will be searched by either name.
Here’s an example of CENLAR’s Unclaimed Property issued by California State Controller:
Date: 6/21/2021
Source: INT
Property ID: 10113989
Owner(s) Name: CASTILLO
Reported Owner Address: 12510 BRADLEY AVE SYLMAR CA 91343-
Type of Property: Escrow check/deposit/Disputed
Cash Reported: $1,306.64
Reported By: CENLAR FEDERAL SAVINGS BANK
You can see the detailed information about CENLAR’s Unclaimed Property above here.
The statement which is issued by the California State Controller above is to announce that there’s an unclaimed property from CENLAR FSB owned by Castillo with the cash reported of $1,306.64. The goal of the statement here is to find property ownership in the form of escrow check/deposit/disputed.
So, if you are the owner of this CENLAR unclaimed property, you will be eligible to claim your property electronically. Then, if your claim is electronically processed, your payment commonly will be issued within 14 days.
In this case, some properties including the money orders, royalties, cashier’s checks, safe deposit box contents are not eligible to be claimed electronically as they will require additional proof of the ownership.
If you have an outstanding debt with a city, state or county agency, your payment will be intercepted to pay the debt. So, if you are the real owner of unclaimed property that CENLAR has, you can start to claim your property by clicking on the ‘Claim This Property’ option under the details of unclaimed property information.
Once you enter the required information needed to claim your property, you will then get notification if your property is eligible to claim electronically.
If you need more information about how to claim your property back with California State Controller, you can contact our CSC Center between 8am and 5pm Pacific Standard Time. Monday through Friday, excluding state holidays at (800) 992-4647 (Nationwide) or (916) 323-2827 (Outside of US), or send them by email.
Can You Search Your Claim Status on CSC?
California State Controller offers a great system where you are able to check the status of an unclaimed property claim that you have already submitted. You don’t have to worry as your personal information will transmit through a secure connection (SSL).
In this case, the Unclaimed Property Claim Status database will continually be updated. If your claim information does not appear in CSC’s system immediately, they have not processed it yet. So, you have to wait approximately 30 days from the date you mailed your package for processing before checking the status of your claim.
- To check your claim status, you can perform it here.
- Choose one of the two options to search by: 1) Claim ID Search 2) Social Security Number Search.
- Then, enter your Claim ID number.
It’s important to note that your Claim ID numbers may be found directly under the barcode which is located at the top of the Claim Affirmation Form you printed when you created your claim.
If you do not know your Claim ID number, instead you can use the Social Security Number Search option to search for the status of your claim.
