CHARITABLE PLANNING

Gillian Howell

By offering philanthropy guidance, you can turn clients’ year-end generosity into year-round strategy.

EAR’ S END IS WHEN MOST CLIENTS’ THOUGHTS TURN TO generosity and charitable giving, and that means now is the time for you to help them connect their philanthropic goals with their overall financial plans. By weaving philanthropy into your discussions toward the end of 2025, you can show them how charitable giving makes their portfolios more tax efficient and strengthens their estate plans and family legacies. You can also discuss how they should be giving through the next year.

Such conversations not only allow you to deliver more strategic and holistic advice, but they also deepen your client relationships and expand your role as a trusted advisor. Below, I outline how you can use year-end giving season as a springboard for four meaningful discussions that will serve your clients well in 2026 and beyond.

1. Tax Planning

A key benefit of charitable giving for most of your clients— aside from helping others— is its helpful impact on taxes. These issues are particularly important this year in light of the One Big Beautiful Bill, the tax and policy law that takes effect January 1, 2026. Here are several timely giving strategies that take advantage of the new tax regime:

• Donor-advised funds. By contributing cash, stock, or other appreciated assets to a donor-advised fund before December 31, your clients can lock in an immediate deduction, invest contributions tax-free, and decide later how to allocate grants. Beginning in 2026, however, the contributions to these funds will not qualify for the new above-the-line charitable deduction available to non-itemizers, so the vehicles are best suited for clients who itemize.

• Bunched contributions. With the return of stricter itemization thresholds, clients will want to consider bunching contributions— i. e., concentrating several years of giving into one high-income year to offset the new 0.5 % adjusted gross income( AGI) floor for deductions. They can still distribute their gifts later over time, especially when using vehicles such as donor-advised funds to implement the strategy.

• Non-cash and complex assets. Your clients can also still avoid capital gains taxes by donating appreciated securities, real estate, or business interests to charity, as long as the gifts exceed the new AGI floor for itemizers.

• Private foundation minimum distribution requirements. Clients with private foundations will still have to pay out a 5 % annual minimum. For those who have already met the requirement, December is a good time to consider additional grants, perhaps something that responds to an urgent need or another project of personal importance to them.

NOVEMBER 2025 | FINANCIAL ADVISOR MAGAZINE | 19