Invaluable resources, right at your fingertips! Our collection of free planned giving tools includes letters, kits, forms, worksheets and more.
Do you have a useful tool you can share with our community? Even if it’s a “diamond in the rough,” contact us to see if we can polish it up and place it online for you.
Most Popular
The 25 Estate Documents
You Need to Put in One Place
Here’s a valuable resource for both fundraisers and their prospects — a simple list of the documents every person should gather together to make sure all estate information is at hand when they pass away. It’s the simple first step for preventing chaos, disappointment, hard work and unnecessary expense resulting from a ragtag, unprepared estate, and it strengthens your role as trusted friend. You can employ this useful document in electronic or hardcopy form to initiate and/or support estate-planning discussions with your prospects.
Donor Characteristics Table
Download this “typical donor” profile document for the answers you need to help you focus on the prospects you have, and discover new ones. Because a donor you don’t know is the same as no donor at all. (A great teaching tool for your staff, too!)
Year-End Giving Solicitation Letter
Every year you want to find compelling reasons for your donors to make vital year-end gifts.
This solicitation letter highlights ways to benefit your organization that don’t even require donors to open their checkbooks. Specifically highlighted are gifts of appreciated securities and charitable gift annuities (CGAs).
The copy encourages your donors to think outside the box about creative ways that they can support your organization and help you carry out your important mission while securing for themselves important tax and income advantages before the end of the year.
Send this compelling year-end call to action to let donors know how they can still make significant gifts that pay them back, but only if they act before December 31…
Planned Giving “Cheat Sheet”
Here’s our popular When, how and why to plan a gift. This is a smaller, 8.5 x 11 inch version of our larger planned giving cheat sheet. Granted, the type is small, but we wanted to make sure those who do not have a large format laser printer could download and print it. This “Cheat Sheet” is the perfect companion to our Pocket Guide.
Donor Testimonial Form
You can add interest to your planned giving website by profiling donors who have already made a planned gift to your institution. You can highlight how easy their gift was to set up, the benefits it is delivering to them, and how satisfied they are that a bequest or annuity allowed them to make a more substantial gift to you than they ever thought possible.
Just customize and print this Donor Testimonial Form and send it, with a nice cover note, to your donors. We’ve set it up with questions that will get your donors’ creativity flowing, and draw out thoughtful, heartfelt statements about why being able to make a significant gift to your institution was so meaningful for them. If you already have donor stories on your site, here is a tool that you can use to continue gathering these testimonials from your donors.
Other Popular Downloads
Do you have a planned giving “elevator speech?”
When the moment arrives, can you briefly describe the right planned giving tool within those precious 15 seconds of your donor’s undivided attention?
Now you can. This handy brochure is a sure-fire guide for development officers, advisors and volunteers who know the value of “pre-packaged scripts” to get your donor thinking about your suggestion. Each major type of planned gift is highlighted with friendly, down-to-earth, short and catchy power phrases to motivate action and plant the seed in your donor’s mind.
Don’t mess with technicalities in today’s world where we have to compete for attention… This is a must-have tool that finally de-mystifies planned giving. Best of all, it’s free.
Planned Giving Marketing and Expense Worksheet
Courtesy of VirtualGiving.Com, here’s a handy form you can use to plan ahead today and make it work for you tomorrow.
It covers print, Web, and e-marketing campaign steps with a suggested schedule to follow. It’s a great tool to begin your organizing and brainstorming process and further your inspiration.
Sample Codicil
A codicil is a document that amends, rather than replaces, a previously executed will. Amendments made by a codicil may add or revoke a few small provisions (e.g., changing executors), or may completely change the majority or all of the gifts under the will.
Each codicil must conform to the same legal requirements as the original will, such as the signatures of the testator and, typically, two or three (depending on jurisdiction) disinterested witnesses.
Remember, it is highly recommended that these forms be used as guides, and that the services of an experienced attorney be rendered.
A Good Question to Ask
Download Jack Miller’s flier and place it on your wall. It will remind you of a good question to ask your donors.
