Many people have charities that they enjoy donating to throughout their lives. It makes sense to want to make one final gift after death, as well.
Fortunately, there is a way to do that: through a will.
How do you bequeath things to charity?
Kiplinger discusses using a will to leave a gift to charity. A bequest is a sentence in the will that discusses the details, including the amount of money that a person wants to gift to a charity, and the charity they want to receive their money.
Accurately identifying the charity or charities
It is possible to bequeath money to multiple charities. The important thing is to accurately identify the charities involved.
This means that a person must list the accurate and legal name of the charity in full. Not writing down the name(s) precisely can result in confusion. For example, two charities with similar names might end up in litigation trouble if one gets a donation by accident due to a misspelling.
Describing your gift’s purpose
A person also has the option of determining what the charity will do with their gifted donation. In some cases, a person may gift it to the general purpose of the charity itself, which means the organization can divide the money and use it as they wish.
It is also possible to designate a specific use, though, such as improving a certain building or expanding on a certain program.
It is a good idea to get in touch with the organization before including them in the will just to ensure that they can actually accept any specified terms, and to get the legal name of the organization.
