Give while you can — within safe tax limits
Many retirees discover late in life they could have given more during their lifetime — and watched the impact — without ever risking their own financial security. The Gifting Strategy Planner finds the safe lifetime giving capacity and structures it tax-efficiently.
What the Gifting Strategy Planner does
- Calculates safe lifetime gifting capacity from your Income Plan's surplus
- Annual exclusion ($18K/recipient in 2024), lifetime exemption, and superfunded 529 modeling
- QCD (Qualified Charitable Distribution) optimization for ages 70.5+
- Donor-advised fund vs. private foundation comparison for charitable givers
- Family loan and intra-family installment sale modeling for larger transfers
A married couple can gift $36,000 per recipient per year ($18K each) without any gift-tax consequences — to as many recipients as they want. Most retirees don't realize how much they could safely give.
How it works
- Import your retirement plan from the Income Planner — the planner pulls your projected surplus.
- Set who you'd like to support: children, grandchildren, charity, alma mater, friends.
- The planner allocates within the annual exclusion + lifetime exemption + QCD limits.
- Outputs a year-by-year gifting calendar plus tax-impact summary.
Why this matters
Most estate plans defer all giving to death. That's tax-efficient but emotionally suboptimal — you don't see the impact, and your heirs receive a windfall during a grieving year. Lifetime giving spreads impact over years, gives you the satisfaction of seeing it, and (done right) costs nothing in additional tax.
This is a planning tool, not personalized financial advice. Larger gifts and any structure involving trusts, family limited partnerships, or installment sales should be implemented with a qualified estate attorney and CPA.
Frequently asked questions
Is the $18K/recipient a limit?
It's the annual *exclusion* — the amount that doesn't even need to be reported. You can gift more, but excess applies against your lifetime exemption ($13.61M in 2024). For most retirees, this means there's no real ceiling on lifetime gifts.
What's a QCD?
A Qualified Charitable Distribution lets retirees age 70.5+ donate directly from an IRA to charity (up to $105K/year in 2024) without recognizing the distribution as income. The tax benefit beats donating cash and itemizing for most retirees.
Should I superfund a 529?
Possibly. The 5-year averaging rule lets you contribute 5x the annual exclusion in one year per beneficiary ($90K single, $180K joint in 2024) for grandchildren or children's education. Removes it from your estate immediately.
Related tools
Ready to run your numbers?
No advisor required. No financial products sold. Just the tool and your data — free.
Plan Your Giving →