Trio return over $40,000 they found in second-hand couch

With all the screaming and carrying on, their neighbours thought they’d won the lottery. But it was a lumpy old sofa stuffed with $40,000 in cash that had three young roommates raising a ruckus.

And, to their credit, they returned the money to the 91-year-old widow whose couch had been given away.

“We just pulled out envelopes and envelopes,” said Cally Guasti, a social worker with Family of Woodstock who shares an apartment with two friends in New Paltz, 75 miles north of New York City.

“My mouth was literally hanging open — everybody’s was — it was an unfathomable amount.”

Ms Guasti said she and her friends had bought the beat-up couch and a chair for $55 at a Salvation Army thrift shop.

They noticed the arm cushions were weirdly lumpy. Then, one night in April, one of them, State University of New York student Reese Werkhoven, opened a zipper on one arm and found an envelope.

It contained $4,000 in bubble-wrapped bills. Ms Guasti, Mr Werkhoven and roommate Lara Russo opened the other arm zipper and started mining the treasure stashed inside. They counted it up: $40,800.

Ms Gausti said they spread the money on the bed and started counting. “And we were screaming,” she said, “In the morning, our neighbours were like, ‘We thought you won the lottery’.”

Mixed in with the cash was a deposit slip with a woman’s name on it. Mr Werkhoven called her.

“She said, ‘I have a lot of money in that couch and I really need it’,” Guasti said.

They drove to the home of the woman, who turned out to be the elderly woman. She cried in gratitude when they gave her the cash she had hidden away.

The woman’s family had donated the couch to the Salvation Army while she was having health problems.

She gave the roommates $1,000 as a reward.