Annual Charitable Contributions

I was cleaning house yesterday (at least with my financial records) and took a look at my charitable contributions so far this year. I realized the end of year is closing fast and I need to address my remaining charitable gifts for the rest of the year.

My unofficial goal has been to raise my charitable giving (on the financial side) by 10% or more each year until I am giving away about 1% of my net worth each year. I have left myself an out by thinking I could donate items or time if I desire, but you get the idea.

I took a look at last years giving totals and made sure with my last donation I was giving more than 10% above last years amount (21.2% more to be exact) and went ahead and made a donation to my favorite charity. Even though I am in a cash crunch, this was a no brainer.

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Comments (3)

As an employee of a non-profit that gets about 40% of its funding from donations, I love to see people giving money to charities! I'm sure your chosen charities appreciate the money and setting a goal to better your giving each year is wonderful.

Posted by Kate | September 29, 2006 7:48 PM

I always make a point to donate as much of my personal house cleaning as I can.
This year I probably have about $20k in charitable contributions of personal possessions.
The biggest challenge is taking the time to catologue everything you give.

You have noble charitable goals, btw, at 1% of net assets.

I've also heard other people discuss giving 10% of their income. The 10% must come from the old religious tithing idea.

Have you considered the other approach?

Regards,
makingourway

Posted by makingourway | October 30, 2006 5:14 AM

Another way to provide for your charity is to take out a life insurance policy with the charity names as the beneficiary. Depending on how you set this up, either the charity can pay the premiums, or you can, and the premiums will be a tax deduction. This can be a great way to leave your favorite charity a substantial amount of money without it coming directly from your own finances in one lump sum.

Posted by Carin | February 23, 2008 10:40 AM