Simplicity describes this mode of giving. You write a check or transfer assets (such as stocks or real estate) directly to the charity. Or, you can wait until you no longer need the asset and make a gift through a bequest in your will, living trust, or beneficiary designation. The charity can be a public charity (such as your alma mater, house of worship, hospital, museum, social service agency, or donor-advised fund) or your own family charity (private foundation, operating foundation, or supporting organization). You still control how the outright gift is used: you can restrict the use of the gift to meet your objectives, or offer an unrestricted gift allowing the charity to designate the use of funds.

Endowment. An endowment ensures that your gift will continue in perpetuity by keeping the principal intact and spending only the income. You create an endowment within the charity so that only the income from the gifted funds is used.

Matching Gift. If you want to entice others to join in your effort, you can make a matching gift. A matching gift is a gift that is contingent upon a certain level of funding from another source, either to assist the charity in generating new sources of general support or for a specific project or program.

Term Gift. You can also create an "exit strategy" with charitable organizations by making a term gift. This provides a series of gifts designed to fund a specific program or project, but with the expectation that at the end of the term, the charity will either find other sources for funds or the project will come to completion. This strategy allows you to set parameters for future solicitations from a charity.

Donor-Advised Fund. Donor-advised funds allow you to make a gift to a sponsoring public charity that holds and invests the funds for distributions recommended at a later date. Although distributions may be spread out over a number of years, you receive the full charitable income tax deduction in the year the gift is made to the donor-advised fund. This option is attractive when you need a significant charitable income tax deduction for a given year, but your giving commitments extend over a longer period of time. You may make grant recommendations as to the recipient of the funds, the timing of the grant, and the uses of such funds. However, the donor-advised fund has the legal right to disregard your advice and make distributions to other nonprofits in keeping with its stated mission. Choosing a donor-advised fund nonprofit with a similar mission statement to your own is important to insure that funds go to organizations that reflect your values.

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Deferred Gifts

Another option, called a deferred gift, enables you to retain an income stream from a gifted property while contributing to a charity, or to transfer assets to your family with discounted dollars. When you transfer highly appreciated assets using this option, you can defer capital gains taxes and take a charitable income tax deduction at the time of the transfer. Three ways to obtain such benefits are via a charitable remainder trust, a charitable gift annuity, and a charitable lead trust.

Charitable Remainder Trust. A charitable remainder trust (CRT) is a highly flexible instrument. It provides current payments to you and then irrevocably transfers the remainder interest of the assets to your favorite charity upon your death, the death of named income beneficiaries, or at the end of a specified term of years. Highly appreciated assets contributed to these trusts can be sold without triggering capital gains to you, thus increasing the amount of funds available for future investment and growth. And you receive a charitable income tax deduction for the remainder interest in the year the trust is established.

There are many varieties of charitable remainder trusts available to meet your personal financial goals. Two of these are charitable remainder annuity trusts and charitable remainder unitrusts. Charitable remainder annuity trusts provide a fixed payment to the current beneficiary, and charitable remainder unitrusts provide variable payments based on the value of the assets in the trust, determined each year.

Charitable Gift Annuity. A charitable gift annuity transaction is very simple; you transfer assets to the charity in return for the charity's agreement to pay you a fixed annuity for your lifetime. Most individuals who select this vehicle do so because of the security that such a transaction provides. The payments you receive are not dependent on the specific asset transferred to the charity, but rather on all assets of the charity. And the payments will always be the same, which helps your financial planning. There are three types of charitable gift annuities: immediate, deferred, and flexible start date annuities.

Charitable Lead Trust. A charitable lead trust enables you to help a charity now, and give to a family member or other designee later, at a discount. It is a gift plan where you transfer income-producing assets to a charity for a certain period of time. The charity receives a portion of the income stream during the term of the trust. When the term ends, the remaining assets are returned to you or to someone designated by you. By delaying the transfer of your assets to your intended beneficiaries, you can transfer significantly more assets at a substantial discount, with fewer transfer taxes.

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Creating Your Own Charity

You may have decided to create your own charity in order to focus your philanthropy on specific programs and interests, and to create a legacy for the family. A family foundation provides many opportunities to express your values and to change the charitable community, while offering a platform to transfer values to the next generation. Once you have identified your goals and objectives, selecting the appropriate charitable entity is critical for success.

Private Foundation. A private foundation gives you the broadest control over your gift. This type of entity, which can be created as a trust or as a corporation, is generally supported by families and is designed to give you maximum control over the use of your charitable dollars. The cost of such control is that such entities do not bring the highest tax benefits and there are complex rules that must be followed in order to retain tax-exempt status. But where there is a desire for control, control of the board and grant or investment decisions, a private foundation will satisfy that need.

Supporting Organization. You may decide that the lesser tax benefits and complexity of the private foundation do not meet your personal and financial goals. If so, a supporting organization may be the solution for you. A supporting organization is treated as a public charity for tax purposes, generating more financial benefit for you. However, the tradeoff for getting a better tax result and less complexity is giving up direct control of the charity. Supporting organizations are generally designed to have a connection with a particular public charity; an organization "supports" one or more designated charities. How close your relationship is to the public charity depends on the type of supporting organization you select.

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