Matching Gifts

More than 8,000 employers nationwide offer matching gift programs that provide an easy way to double or triple your contribution. Even past gifts, and gifts from retirees and spouses, are sometimes eligible for a match. To find out if your company will match your gift, contract your Human Resources office for a matching gift form to submit with your contribution.

Real Estate

Before you sell real estate, consider a new option. If you'd like to help fulfill our mission, your property opens the door to a unique giving opportunity: donate the property to us. You can give the property outright (and still live in it for the rest of your life), place it in trust or give it by will. All of these methods will enable you to enjoy personal financial benefits while supporting our work in a meaningful way.

Retirement Plan Assets

Tax-deferred retirement plans, such as IRAs, 401(k) and 403(b) accounts are a major factor in financial and estate planning as well as gift planning due to their tax-deferred nature. Since the tax is deferred on these assets, at death they are potentially subject to both estate taxes and income taxes. If the transfer of the retirement accounts to the surviving family members is not handled properly, the retirement assets could be subject to as much as a 65% combined tax.

As a result of this tax pitfall, many individuals are using retirement plan assets to make gifts to tax-exempt organizations, such as Discover Goodwill Foundation. Currently, the most efficient way to pass retirement plan assets is at death by naming Discover Goodwill Foundation as the designated beneficiary on the retirement account documents. The beneficiary designation can be for a fixed dollar amount or a percentage of the retirement account. Lastly, you can insert instructions into your Will or revocable trust stating that charitable contributions should be made first from the retirement plan assets before any other assets are used. Fulfilling charitable bequests with retirement plan accounts avoids the potential taxes on these accounts.