What You Should Know About Bequeathing to Charity in Your Will

By Jessica Sillers — Apr 21, 2020

Writing your will is an opportunity to think about how you’d like people to remember you when you’re gone. For lots of families, that means choosing guardians and providing for children in the will. Another way to keep your legacy alive? Donating to charity.

Whether you call it a bequest, an endowment, a legacy, or simply a gift, money or assets you leave to charity can be a meaningful part of your final plans. No matter how large or small your estate is, there’s a way to leave a legacy to a cause you care about.

What Is Bequeathing to Charity?

Donating to charity doesn’t always mean writing a check. There are a number of different ways to give back through your estate planning.

We at Fabric aren't lawyers. So, before deciding how to incorporate charitable giving as part of your estate plan, we encourage you to speak with a qualified legal professional about your specific needs and goals. (Do you need a lawyer to write your will?)

Cash Donation Through Your Will

Any reputable charity can put a cash donation to good use. These are a few ways you can divide your money between your loved ones and favorite organization:

General gift: Name a specific amount of money or a percentage of your estate that should go to your preferred charity.

Residual gift: Designate how much of your estate should go to each of your other beneficiaries, and then send anything that’s left over to charity.

Contingent gift: You can choose to donate to charity as a backup plan, such as if your beneficiary passes away before you. The condition doesn’t need to be based on death, either. You could theoretically say that if your cousin goes to rehab and stays out of jail, he gets $10,000, but otherwise the money will go to an anti-addiction organization you support.

All you need to do is include a note in your last will and testament listing your chosen charities with the amount or percentage of your estate that they should receive.

Donating Investments to Charity

You can donate most stocks, bonds or mutual funds directly to a charity. In fact, this option can be better for some organizations than if you sold the investment and donated the cash.

Tony Oommen, a charitable planning consultant at Fidelity Charitable, explains that donating the investment directly can eliminate capital gains taxes. The value here is that the charity ends up getting more money than if you’d cashed out the investment and donated the after-tax dollars.

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