Women’s spending power has been in the news over the last several weeks as Taylor Swift’s and Beyonce’s tours continue to break records, and the Barbie movie still looms large. As you’ve worked with female clients over the years, you’ve likely noticed a few trends:
- Women frequently take on caregiving roles within a family, including caring for both their parents and their own children, and often while also working full-time or owning businesses.
- Women often take the lead on charitable giving decisions.
- Women often find themselves living alone at some point, including because of a spouse’s death or divorce.
- Women often have a hard time putting themselves first.
At the FM Area Foundation, we are always up to date on the trends in philanthropy that affect women as they build charitable components of their estate and financial plans. Our team is happy to provide helpful resources if you’d like to learn more about how philanthropy plays a role in your female clients’ lives.
Here are three examples of cases where the FM Area Foundation team can help:
Family philanthropy vehicle funded with tax-efficient assets
We can work with you and your client to establish a donor-advised fund that includes your client and her children as advisors so that they can all learn together about nonprofit organizations in our community and jointly decide on grant recipients, tapping the knowledge and connections of the community foundation team. We can help you identify the most optimal assets for your client to transfer to the donor-advised fund, including highly appreciated stock, real estate, or even an interest in a closely held business.
Funds dedicated to a specific area of interest funded with IRAs
Our team can provide deep research and expertise on a client’s specific areas of interest, whether that’s the arts, education, emergency assistance, medical research, or another cause that is important to your client. Then, we can work with your client to establish a field-of-interest fund at the community foundation to receive Qualified Charitable Distributions from your client’s IRAs. Your client can also name the field-of-interest fund as the beneficiary of the IRA to receive the remaining assets at her death. Your client will enjoy the confidence of knowing that her charitable priorities will continue to be supported for years to come, even beyond her lifetime.
Organization-specific support formally incorporated in an estate plan
For a client who has dedicated many years of her life to supporting a particular charitable organization, including perhaps even serving on the organization’s board of directors, our team can work with you to help the client understand what that organization needs to be successful for many generations. Then, we can work with your client to help fill those gaps. For example, grants from the client’s donor-advised fund could provide the money needed to hire a new staff person or purchase new technology to improve the charity’s ability to deliver on its mission. Your client could even leave a bequest in her will or trust to establish a designated fund at the community foundation that provides supplemental income each year to the organization’s operating budget.
We look forward to working together as you help your female clients achieve their financial and charitable goals.
