Money does not buy happiness 😳, but it pays for freedom 🤗. Freedom in time, spending power, health (physical|mental|emotional|spiritual) and social impact. Is that why Billionaires flock to the unselfish philanthropic giving pledge or is it 🤔?
What Is A Foundation?
A foundation is almost always perceived as a charitable entity, many of which spread and promote positive change to environmental challenges, poverty and other persistent problems 🙌👏🌹
Many successful people who have traditionally defined their success by the amount of money they have accumulated, or hope to accumulate, re-examine their approach to money and hence turn their lives into something more fulfilling. The Wealth Creator’s Playbook of author John Christianson states that a true fulfilling "life portfolio" is based upon:
Many fierce critics like Anand Giridharandas, author of Winners Take All, argue that the elite's efforts to change the world amount to hypocrisy. First because the charitable giving is often made possible by morally questionable gains in the marketplace and many other are even more skeptical about the substantial TAX benefits 💰 of charitable giving. So let’s take a closer look to all these benefits shall we…😏
The Benefits
Simply put a private foundation is a tax-exempt charity that is funded and controlled by an individual or a family. A private foundation may be set up as a not-for-profit corporation or as a trust. Whichever arrangement you choose, a private foundation is treated the same for tax purposes.
The Internal Revenue Code defines many kinds of non-profit organizations that do not pay income tax. However, only charitable organizations can receive tax-deductible contributions and avoid paying property and sales tax. For instance, a donor would receive a tax deduction for money given to a local soup kitchen if the organization was classified as 501(c)(3) organization, but not for giving money to the National Football League, even though the NFL is a 501(c)(6) non-profit association.
What’s In It For You, The Investor?
Giving through a private foundation offers tremendous advantages over giving as an individual or simply giving to existing public charities. Besides the obvious purposeful & fulfilling selfless act of giving, your direct philanthropic impact in your community or the world and establishing your personal legacy it also offers tremendous financial benefits as well.
Tax Savings for You and Your Estate
Giving to a private foundation may make it possible for you to:
Reduce your income tax for every year in which you make a contribution
Avoid capital gains taxes depending on the characteristics of the property contributed
Reduce or eliminate potential estate taxes. Grow your charitable funds in a tax-advantaged environment, and keep & pass control of them to future generations to continue your philanthropy.
We are not tax advisors, attorneys nor CPA’s so we strongly encourage you to seek professional help for your specific needs or consult comprehensive support services like: foundationsource.com
We only want to make you aware of the strategic possibilities to keep and grow your wealth 🍀. Okay, so we're clear on this? Good let’s go on 👠…
Income Tax Savings
An immediate tax benefit you get as a donor is an income tax deduction for any amount you contribute to your private foundation up to 30% of your adjusted gross income (AGI). Even though you get the tax deduction up front, you can make your charitable deductions over time. The immediate income tax deduction for contributions lowers the cost of giving to charity. For example, if a donor is in a 50 percent combined state and federal income tax bracket, it will cost him just 50 cents, after taxes, to put a dollar in his foundation.
Capital Gains Tax Savings
Besides a deduction for income taxes on gifts to your private foundation, you may also be able to avoid paying capital gains taxes by donating highly appreciated assets to your private foundation.
Let’s break it down, money talks 🤑
If you were to give some of your appreciated stocks to a foundation, you would be entitled to receive an income tax deduction for the full, fair-market value of the stock. When the foundation decides to sell the stock in the future, it will pay only the nominal excise tax of 1% or 2% on the net capital gains instead of the capital gains you would pay as an individual selling your stocks for profit. Double capital gains 💰.
My 100 Good4You Stocks appreciate from $1000 to $5000 a gain of $400.000. Taxable anywhere from 15% (held longer 1yr) to 37% income tax brackets (held short term). Let’s take 20% as an average. That would be: $80.000 😫 ouch…! But when you donate those assets to your private foundation, you now can deduct your income with $500.000 this year. When your Foundation sells the stocks it will only pay $5000 on capital gains. The best advantage yet besides all that goodness of TAX FREE wealth growth is you remain in control of the investment and management of the funds as well as the final charitable disposition of the gifts.
Same goes for under-performing stocks you can donate those unproductive assets to your private foundation, sell them in a tax-advantaged environment, and reinvest the proceeds for a higher return. The investment earnings can then be used to make donations or even loans to charities.
Make Loans Instead of Grants
When used to support a charitable purpose, private foundations can employ loans, loan guarantees and even equity investments, which are paid back (potentially with interest), so you can recycle your philanthropic capital for other charitable causes.
Estate Tax Savings
When your assets are contributed to your private foundation, they are excluded from your estate and as a result, are not subject to either federal or state estate taxes 🎉. As you become a high-net-worth real estate investor who has a strong charitable interest 🌹, your private foundation offers you an opportunity to avoid paying estate taxes while creating a positive legacy.
Tax-Advantaged Growth
Because assets you contribute to a private foundation will be able to grow in a tax-advantaged environment, over the years, the foundation’s value will likely exceed the total amount of your contributions—despite making regular charitable grants. The result will be a significant charitable legacy that your heirs may continue to control and pass down to future generations in perpetuity.
Pay Expenses and Hire Staff
Private foundations also have more freedom over other types of charitable vehicles:
PAY EXPENSES; When you have a private foundation, all legitimate and reasonable expenses incurred in carrying out your philanthropy count towards your foundation’s minimum distribution requirement (the IRS requires that private foundations distribute at least 5% of average investment assets annually). Travel expenses for site visits, board meetings, conferences, office supplies and many other professional fees qualify.
HIRE STAFF; Federal tax law permits foundations to pay “reasonable compensation” to qualified staff—even if the foundation is staffed by your family.
Donate Real Estate To A Private Foundation
If you’re considering a large gift, a noncash donation such as appreciated real estate can provide additional benefits. For example, if you’ve held the property for more than one year, you generally will be able to deduct its full fair market value and avoid any capital gains tax you’d owe if you sold the property. While real estate donations to a public charity generally can be deducted at the property’s fair market value, your deduction for such a donation to a private foundation is limited to the lower of fair market value or your cost basis in the property.
Other Non TAX related Benefits
Run Charitable Programs Without Setting Up A Separate Nonprofit
Direct charitable activities are IRS-approved programs that permit foundations to directly fund and carry out their own projects, directly put your money to it’s best good.
Grant Individuals
Private foundations are permitted to provide funds directly to individuals for emergency relief or hardship assistance.
Donate Internationally
Private foundations can grant directly to overseas charitable organizations, even when there is no IRS-recognized 501(c)(3) entity to serve as an intermediary.
Give Awards and Prizes
Awards reward past performance (the Nobel Prize), while prizes serve as an incentive for future performance to encourage and stimulate innovation in a specific area (Research Foundations or Startup Prizes in urgent health issues like Pharmaceuticals do).
Public and Community Relations
Use the work of the foundation to bring positive recognition to yourself, your foundation and grow your network and your community impact.
Privacy and Sidestep Unsolicited Requests
If you are already being bombarded with fundraising requests you now have a friendly escape by referring all such inquiries to the private family foundation (acceptance procedure).
Powerful Lobby
The october 2017 "Tax Cuts and Jobs Act" was the largest overhaul of the tax code in three decades but the law leaves the charitable contributions deduction intact (and even doubled the estate exemptions to over $11,2 Million). Don’t lose a single night's sleep over what might happen to your wealth or legacy.
To best understand and capitalize the different asset classes and build wealth to donate to your private foundation and charities you care for,
we recommend you read this:
Disadvantages of Starting a Private Foundation
Fair enough, we will try to summarize some of the possible disadvantages to starting a private foundation here. We explicitly say try because we feel that those disadvantages are disproportionally less of a burden than the massive advantages you can gain in your wealth growing endeavors.
Initial Time Commitment and Costs including legal and accounting fees.
Excise Tax. Private foundations have to pay a 1-2% annual excise tax on net income depending on the level of grants received from year to year. The tax provides money to pay the costs incurred by the government in regulating private foundations.
Recordkeeping Requirements. At a minimum, family foundations must properly document grants and keep regular meeting minutes, which for small foundations may require an investment of 2-6 hours per cycle. But remember it can be run like a for profit organization with all costs and staff being deducted.
Regulatory Requirements. There are two main classes of tax-exempt charitable organizations: public charities (funded by a variety of public sources) and private foundations (privately funded or endowed). Private foundations are required to distribute at least 5% of their net investment assets annually in the form of charitable grants and are subject to tighter scrutiny than public charities.
Annual Reporting Requirements. Tax filings required by the IRS and most states typically require 4-8 hours to complete each year by an accountant or attorney.
Lower Deductibility Caps. Individuals may receive tax deductions for donations to public charities to the extent of 60% of their adjusted gross income (AGI) for cash gifts and 30% of AGI for gifts of appreciated property. For gifts to private foundations, however, the limits are 30% of AGI for cash gifts and 20% of AGI for appreciated property.
Less Favorable Treatment of Some Capital Gain Gifts. Gifts to public charities of appreciated property are deductible at fair market value. To private foundations, gifts of appreciated property are deductible on a cost basis only (with the exception of publicly traded stock which is deductible at fair market value).
You Can’t Afford Not To Give…
The compounding wealth creation value of all these tax benefits over time is simply mind-blowing. In one generation, smart use of the tax incentives can double the amount available for charity without reducing the amount you can keep for your own use. Only the private foundation offers legal control on top of the tax benefits and flexibility in how to invest and how to spend the money.
Private foundations play an important role with a unique combination of grant-making control, investment flexibility, tax benefits while providing you the joy and satisfaction that comes with making a charitable impact in your community, society and the world.
Don’t hate on the Billionaire's row but use these powerful incentives provided to investors like you. Ultimately, you can only help and give when you have more than enough & your own cup is running over (as Oprah always says). Now you too have the perfect alibi 😏...
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