Money from Another Time

[beetiger]

I was at my safe deposit box today, pulling some papers I'll need for renewing passports in order to take a trip to Florence this summer. There was an envelope in there which I'd kinda tossed in with my important papers, after my mother had tossed it at me at my father's funeral, a decade ago.

In it are a bunch of US savings bonds, mostly dated 1968 and 1969, totalling about $1000 face value. They're E bonds, with a seven-year maturity. (There's also a EE bond I seem to have won as a prize in high school, and one someone gave me as an engagement gift I think, but I'm pretty sure those keep earning interest for 30 years and I should leave them alone.) I kind of feel like I should cash the ones from the sixties out, as I've already managed to make my way through college, and although I'm sure that in some sense this is a very secure way to keep a little financial insurance pillow, it just seems kind of silly to have them sitting there.

So, how do I do this? Can I just take them to a local bank, endorse them, and have them figure out what kind of interest there may or may not have been accruing over the last 39 years or so? Do I need to go to some government office or other? Is there any chance that these have expired and are worthless or something?

I know, I know, I could probably just google this. But I feel like talking to you.

Comments

[cowboy-r.livejournal.com]

Just take 'em to the bank, and they'll figure out the current value. I cashed an E series bond a few years ago, and was pleasantly surprised at how much more than face value it yielded.

[bikergeek.livejournal.com]

Yup, I won a savings bond at some sort of awards ceremony my senior year of high school (1984) and my mom find it while going through some of my old stuff in the mid 90s. it was worth substantially more than that when I went to my bank to cash it. At the time, I just took it to my regular bank. They have tables where they can look up the value and simply pay you.

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

Did that last summer actually. It's more or less just like cashing a check at a bank.

[read-alicia.livejournal.com]

Why go to the bank when the government has a Savings Bond Calculator online?

My great-aunt left my dad a few $25 savings bonds from the 1930's, but when we cashed them in the '90s, they were maxxed out at ~$100.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Many years ago I went to the bank to do it.

[varjohaltia.livejournal.com]

Check out:
http://www.savingsbonds.gov/indiv/indiv.htm

The above site has tables and a little downloadable utility that lets you figure out the value.

There's a limit of $1000 as to what you can cash in a bank, after that you have to send them into a government office -- or you just cash them in in smaller batches. Note that you probably have to pay capital gains on the proceeds, unless you manage to use them towards education or somesuch. See the above site for all you ever wanted to know :-)

As to whether it's worth to keep or not depends. Can you get a better rate out of a CD / money market account or a mutual fund?

[redbird]

When I had a series E bond that was past maturity (an old gift from my grandparents) turn up at a time when we could really use the money, I just took it to my bank, and cashed it, with a nice chat with a teller who approved of my having held it as long as I had.

Someone mentioned capital gains; I don't know what the rules on savings bonds are, but if it applies at all, you'd be paying at the lowest very-long-term rate.

Check at treasury.gov to see if they're still accruing interest. If they are, you could do worse than leave them alone if, unlike me when I found the one I'd forgotten, you don't need the money right now.

Old bonds

[allessindra.livejournal.com]

I can't remember what they are called now, but there *are* bonds from the mid-1960s that are *not* in the database the banks now have. I have a couple, and will have to go to an actual Reserve Bank to get them dealt with.

I also need to go to somewhere high up along with two wills to prove that I am actually the beneficiary of the multiple bonds that were made out to my Aunt with no other person on them, that *she* got as an inheritance. (The lawyers executing the estate couldn't find her for too long and put that portion of the estate into bonds as a safe easy 'escrow' way to hold them till they found the person they were looking for.)

grarg. another reason I need a personal assistant.