Sharpe Blog

The end of one year and the beginning of another always marks a busy season for those engaged in charitable gift development activities. Recent tax law changes and economic factors give us more reasons to make our “to-do” lists. “To do” at the end of 2019 December 31 falls on a Tuesday this year. Have …Read More

I get this question a lot. The answer isn’t provided by tax law, because the tax law is unconcerned about gift counting. Nonetheless, the tax law applies to the date of gift, for example. As a result, a counting decision in some situations — say, when to count a year-end gift — may wind up …Read More

As we approach the end of the year, many nonprofits experience their highest level of donations. This rush of individual gifts, and holiday vacations, can sometimes slow down organizational processes of depositing and receipting gifts. For almost all types of gifts, this delay has no tax consequences. For example, if a donor mails a check …Read More

Last time, we looked at credit card gifts and some of the problems with these gifts…including the credit card fee. We left off with an equation for figuring the amount Doris should charge to her credit card so that after the 2.5% credit card fee, the charity winds up with $10,000: X – .025X = …Read More

Last time, we looked at credit card gifts…and some of the problems with these gifts. There’s one more problem, a common problem, with credit card gifts, which arises when the donor wants to establish a gift annuity with a credit card. Let’s take the case of Doris, aged 79, who wants to set up a …Read More

Last time, we looked at some problems related to the donor. Now we look at problems related to the asset the donor wants to use to make the gift. The discussion here could fill a two-volume gift planning reference service. The assets range from credit card gifts, to gifts of partnership interests, to gifts of …Read More

The problems often fall into two categories: problems related to the donor, and problems related to the asset(s) the donor wants to use to make the gift. Problems Related to the Donor The first potential problem here is identifying who is the donor. The donor is the party holding legal title to the asset proposed …Read More

One can’t raise money for a charity without having an insight into this question and its answers. In my experience, the reasons individuals make charitable gifts include: a strong desire to give back for some service the charity has provided to the donor or to a close family member or friend (a service such as …Read More

I don’t know. I’m a lawyer, and try as I may, I cannot, in any law library, find a definition of “estate note”. It’s a made-up, meaningless term. There are, however, two instruments wrongfully called “estate notes”: an enforceable pledge, and a contract to make a will. The garden variety enforceable pledge is a naming …Read More

We left off last time with the fact that the qualified appraisal (Q.A.) rules were revised substantially as of January 1, 2019. Yes, the Q.A. rules are the donor’s problem. But they become the donee’s problem if the donee receives a copy of the donor’s appraisal and doesn’t send the donor a letter stating that …Read More