Sharpe Blog

Perhaps not, but often the completion of a planned gift does necessitate teamwork. Larger commitments (six figures and higher for most givers) trigger income tax, estate planning, retirement income and insurance consequences. The donor often contemplates a planned gift in response to the challenge of “wanting to do more” but “not sure if I (or …Read More

In Part 1, I shared a story of client who asked for a residual gift instead a specific dollar amount and ended up with a rather large estate gift. There is often great internal pressure to ask for and “book” a specific value for a gift, which is all but impossible for residuary gifts. This …Read More

Sharpe Group generally encourages its clients to seek out residuary estate gifts instead of gifts of specific dollar amounts. Is this always a good idea? Let me share a story of two charities, one that requested a residual gift and one that requested a specific amount from the same donor, and how things unfolded. After …Read More

Sharpe Group is pleased to welcome back to the team, Kristin Croone. Kristin recently returned to Sharpe as a Senior Consultant after taking a short break from the gift planning field. She has a J.D. from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. She previously worked with Sharpe as a technical editor and has worked …Read More

There’s something important about 2020 charitable giving that’s not been reported in the press. 2020 was a banner year for planned gifts. Annual giving held up well too. At least, that’s what I’ve heard from my clients—a mix of top-notch educational, healthcare, arts and social service organizations. Good news, but no surprise to me. No …Read More

In the final days of 2020, President Donald Trump signed the biggest COVID-19 relief package since the CARES Act passed last spring. Incoming President Joe Biden and Congress have signaled that additional help and stimulus are needed to battle the pandemic and accompanying economic woes that unfolded in the first quarter of 2020. President Biden …Read More

Sec. 7520(c)(2) of the Internal Revenue Code requires the updating of the actuarial tables every 10 years. In August 2020, the National Center for Health Statistics and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released updated tables for the 2009-2011 period. This report shows the continual improvement in longevity. Almost 6,300 more people out of …Read More

Last time, I suggested this language for a year-end cash gift receipt: Thank you for your cash gift of $5,000 made by your Chase Bank check number 2651, dated December 31, 2020, which [our charity] received in the mail on January 4, 2021. [Our charity] provided no goods or services to you in consideration of …Read More

In establishing a testamentary charitable gift annuity that qualifies for the federal estate tax charitable deduction, all the variables must be discernible at the date of the donor’s passing. These variables could be described either in (1) the beneficiary designation document itself such as the will or trust or (2) a stand-alone agreement on file …Read More

In a lot of years, January has been hectic for me. Why? Because my phone has rung ceaselessly about year-end gift problems. What sorts of problems? These have been typical phone calls: Donor wired stock to us in late December, but we didn’t receive the stock until January. Our business office says we keep our …Read More