Legacy Giving
A Bequest Is a Check. A Structured Policy Is an Endowment.
Legacy giving with life insurance is the strategy where a donor names a charitable institution — a high school, university, athletic program, museum, or civic arts organization — as the owner and beneficiary of a permanent life insurance policy. A manageable annual premium becomes a multiple-of-premium gift at death. The donor takes a current-year tax deduction on premiums paid into the charity-owned policy; the institution receives a transformational gift years or decades later; the donor’s name lives on a building, a scholarship, a coaching seat, or a gallery in a way no annual-fund check ever could. Most donors have never been shown this option.
Begin a conversation →Two paths. One institution to endow.
Most donors arrive thinking “estate giving” means a bequest in a will. The structured-policy alternative is the path most development offices don’t know how to ask for — and the one that turns an annual gift into an endowment.
A pledge in your will. A check at death.
The conventional path. The donor names the institution in a will or revocable trust, and the gift is paid out of the estate at death. The dollar amount is whatever the estate leaves; there is no leverage, no current-year deduction, and no certainty.
- No current-year tax deduction
- Gift size limited to what’s left in the estate
- No leverage — one dollar pledged, one dollar given
An annual premium today. A named endowment forever.
A permanent life insurance policy owned by and naming the institution as beneficiary. Premiums paid into the charity-owned policy generate a current-year deduction; the death benefit, often many multiples of total premiums paid, becomes a named endowment, scholarship, coaching seat, or facility in the donor’s lifetime intent.
- Current-year deduction on every premium paid
- Death benefit typically many multiples of premiums paid
- Donor’s name is set in the institution while they’re still here
The leveraged gift is the gift most donors never hear about.
If any of these describe your situation — or your donor’s — a structured legacy policy turns a manageable annual premium into the kind of endowment that names buildings, scholarships, and coaching seats in the donor’s lifetime intent.
- i. You give regularly to your high school, university, alma mater, museum, or local arts organization, and you’d like the gift to be transformational rather than incremental.
- ii. You’ve considered leaving the institution money in your will, but no one has shown you the math of a leveraged structured policy.
- iii. You played a sport or pursued an art at a school that shaped your career, and you want to permanently endow a scholarship, coaching position, or facility name.
- iv. You’re a development officer whose donors keep asking about “estate giving” without anyone modeling the actual mechanics.
Legacy gifts, designed with your institution.
Remain Life Insurance Services, LLC designs a structured legacy policy from a target gift size and a manageable annual premium — named institution, scholarship or facility, projected endowment value — alongside a side-by-side comparison to a traditional bequest, in coordination with the institution’s development office.
Request a legacy gift design, or speak with a Remain advisor directly.