Meet Our Donors

We thank all our planned-gift donors for their generous support. Here are some of their stories.

---

Syrinda Paige

"Planned giving and the use of a vehicle like a Donor Advised Fund can make it easier to donate the value of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and exchange-traded funds quickly and easily to a charity like Covenant House Greater Washington."
- Covenant House Greater Washington Board Member & Donor, Syrinda Paige

Robert and Natasha Schooling

Robert and Natasha Schooling, made a generous stock gift to Covenant House Greater Washington. Mr. Schooling said "Covenant House puts faith into action by serving the most vulnerable among us – homeless young people. My wife and I were honored to be able to make a gift of stock to support the work of Covenant House Greater Washington and urge others to get involved in any way they can. Donating stock was easy and it allowed us to maximize our gift to Covenant House." The revenue generated from the sale of the securities will help Covenant House Greater Washington serve more homeless, disconnected and exploited young people. Robert and Natasha will receive an income tax deduction for the fair market value of the securities on the date of transfer.

Justin

I bought a lot of life insurance when our family was young. Wanted to be sure that Bev and our children would be taken care of should anything unexpected happen to me.

Well, I'm still around, thank goodness. Our children are grown and settled, and Bev and I did a little better financially than we ever thought would be possible when we were starting out. Truth is, our family no longer needed all the life insurance coverage I was carrying for them.

That excess insurance was really an asset that was no longer productive for us. We talked about it with our accountant, and she said that we could donate some policies to our favorite charity – Covenant House Greater Washington. We would receive an income tax deduction approximately equal to the cash surrender value of the policies, which would come in very handy at tax time.

Covenant House Greater Washington could either cash in the policies and use the funds for current projects, or hold them for the death benefits they will pay when we die.

It was a win-win result: we were able to help Covenant House Greater Washington out significantly, but we did it by using assets we had almost forgotten about, and in a way that didn't affect our cash-flow or our family's security.

Kurt, with his favorite granddaughter, Emily

After my wife Karen died, I began to appreciate much more the organizations to which she had been so devoted. Covenant House Greater Washington was always her favorite, and I began to look for ways that my giving could keep her commitment alive.

I decided to make a bequest to Covenant House Greater Washington. Trouble was, I had just re-written my will, and I didn't want to go the time and expense of having a new document drawn just to add a bequest to Covenant House Greater Washington.

My lawyer told me that I could set up the gift through a codicil to my existing will. She told me that a codicil is a simple document that makes specific changes to a will – like adding a charitable bequest – but leaves everything else alone. It's a great solution for making minor adjustments to an estate plan you're otherwise happy with.

She had the codicil ready for me to sign in two days – and now I can rest easy knowing that the organization that meant so much to Karen will be hearing from her once again.