The generation following the Baby Boomers, Generation X, is poised to be an important fundraising prospect. They were born between 1965 and 1980. Because both parents worked and they came home to empty houses after school, Gen X is frequently called the “latchkey generation.”  There are around 65 million Gen Xers in the U.S. They …Read More

Question: My current planned giving provider offers too many choices, and I don’t use most of them. What are three things I should focus on to grow my program? First step: Clean your donor data (update age, wealth, marital status, income, address, deceased, etc.) to maximize time and budget with Sharpe’s Data Services. With our …Read More

Donor advised funds continue to be a major source of revenue for charities. Some key findings from The Annual DAF Report 2025 authored by the DAF Research Collaborative:   1,485 DAF sponsors managed 3.56 million DAF accounts in FY 2024. Grants from DAFs increased by 19% to $64.89 billion in FY 2024. Contributions to DAFs …Read More

Here are some tips to help you stay on course for planned giving success. 1. Stay on top of economic conditions. With fluctuations in the economy and prices continuing to rise, donors will be more receptive to gift plans that offer a greater degree of certainty, like charitable gift annuities or gifts with additional tax …Read More

The dramatic gains of the last 10 years in the capital markets compel trustees of charitable lead annuity trusts (CLATs) to examine whether the moment of commutation has arrived. Private Letter Ruling 202614004 (4/3/2026) addressed the three primary tax risks in attempting a commutation. 1. No Self-Dealing Section 4941 imposes an excise tax on each …Read More