#413 - Stock, DAFs, IRAs: The Year-End Gifts You’re Not Asking For

Here’s the uncomfortable math. About 97% of wealth sits in non-cash assets. Stock, DAFs, crypto, retirement accounts. And your year-end appeal offers two options: credit card or check. You’re asking for the 3%. Two years ago, only 14% of nonprofits received a single gift from the other 97%.

Allison Fine is president and CEO of every.org, a giving platform that is itself a nonprofit. It takes stock, crypto, DAF, and now IRA gifts, liquidates them, and sends the nonprofit cash. It charges nothing. It’s funded by grants and donations, and it was built so a small shop could accept gifts that feel exotic or legalistic. One org on the platform, with a budget under $500,000, has received $115,000 in DAF and stock gifts.

We start with the IRA. There’s $18 trillion sitting in IRAs in this country. At 70.5, donors can move up to $115,000 a year straight to charity through a qualified charitable distribution. Except some financial institutions mail the check to the donor and trust it’ll find its way to you. Spoiler: it often doesn’t. Then Allison names your real competition. It’s not the nonprofit down the street. It’s the bank holding the DAF, which is very good at convincing donors to park money there instead of giving it to you.

Then we get practical. Your donation page looks like a ransom note, and your stock instructions live in a five-page PDF nobody opens. Younger donors expect giving to work like banking: two clicks and done. Send a one-page giving guide with your EIN and transfer details so donors can forward it to their advisor. And on the back end, Allison’s line is the one I’ll be repeating all season: a tax receipt is not a thank-you note.

Then Allison drops a warning I needed to hear. Billionaires are masking the collapse of everyday donors, and first-year retention sits around 19%. I named the tension every under-resourced shop feels: if you’ve got three hours, the six-figure donor wins on ROI. Her answer is that you don’t get to pick one. And it comes down to a bigger question. Are you selling a product, or building a community? 

We close on December 31. It matters for your cash, stock, crypto, and IRA givers. It does not matter to your DAF or family foundation donors, so stop pressuring them on your timeline instead of theirs.

If your year-end plan is “click here to donate,” this conversation is for you.

Important Links:

every.org: https://www.every.org

Allison Fine: https://www.linkedin.com/in/allison-fine-a07132/ 

My Big Ask Gifts Program: https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program

My Book, Get That Money Honey: https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey

My Newsletter: https://www.rheawong.com/