Foundations
Private foundations have long been the charitable vehicle of choice for America’s prominent families. However, until recently the costs and complexity of starting and running a foundation made it prohibitive for all but the wealthiest families. Today Ensemble Capital is proud to offer private foundation services for accounts as small as $250,000. Our goal is to allow you to concern yourself with nothing more than which nonprofits to give to and how big to make the check.
See a demonstration of our online foundation administration platform.
Foundation Advantages
Private foundations are the most flexible of the various charitable vehicles. They are a distinct legal entity that is controlled by your family. When you make a gift of appreciated stock into your foundation, you avoid paying capital gains taxes, take an income tax deduction for the full market value of the gifted stock, and permanently shield those assets from the estate tax, although the assets stay under the control of your family.
Foundations are unique philanthropic entities that can engage in a variety of innovative charitable strategies. We can help you explore concepts such as loaning money to nonprofits, making emergency grants to individuals, investing in new nonprofits and making grants to international organizations. In addition to the tax and operational benefits of starting a foundation, there are important advantages for families who wish to engage in philanthropy together. Foundations are controlled by a board, generally made up of family members, and the president of the foundation is given the ability to grant whatever degree of authority they decide is appropriate to each board member. By providing a framework for coming together to talk about your most deeply held values and beliefs, private foundations facilitate making philanthropy part of your family tradition.
We offer comprehensive services for private foundations: