Clerk Of Court Issues Plea To Foreclosed Cook County Property Owners To Come Forward, Claim Their Cash; Says $16M In Sale Surplus Sits Unclaimed

In Chicago, Illinois, the Chicago Sun-Times reports:

• About $16 million is sitting in a Cook County court fund, just waiting for the rightful owners — namely home and business owners who lost their property to foreclosure, officials said Thursday.



• The money is part of a mortgage foreclosure surplus fund — profits generated when foreclosed property is sold for more than what the original owner owed the bank.



• Nearly 2,000 property owners have an average of $2,000 coming to them from foreclosures that date back to the 1990s. Amounts range from 13 cents to $460,000 owed to a business, Brown said.



• For two years, Clerk of the Circuit Court Dorothy Brown has been trying to get the word out to former property owners to call her office or go to her website and use the search engine to see if they have money coming to them.



• By state law, her office maintains the account. But having had only marginal success in finding those to whom money is due, she announced Thursday that a task force of city, county and state officials is working on a better marketing strategy. “We need to find a better way, even a more effective way to get the word out,” Brown said Thursday at a news conference with other elected leaders.

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• “A lot of people just don’t look back” once they lose a property, she said. “They don’t leave a forwarding address because they have creditors” seeking payment.



• To see if you are owed mortgage surplus funds, call Brown’s office at (312) 603-5030 or go to [Cook County Mortgage Foreclosure Surplus Search].

For more, see Property foreclosed? Cook Co. hold $16M in fund waiting to be claimed.

See also, Chicago Tribune: Cook Co. reaching out to those due money after property foreclosure ("Brown noted that her office contacted one homeowner who was owed a $200,000 surplus. The homeowner never returned the call.").