Donor-Advised Funds: The Source Fundraisers Can't Afford to Ignore

• The number of DAF accounts increased by 7 percent in 2012 over 2011;
• DAF assets grew 18.9 percent in 2012 over 2011, exceeding $45 billion in total assets;
• DAF accounts in 2012 totalled more than $13.7 billion;
• More than $8.6 billion was granted in 2012 from DAFs;
• The average DAF account size reached nearly $225,000 in 2012, up 11.2 percent from 2011;
• Payout rates from DAFs exceeded 16 percent from 2007 through 2012.

And according to Fidelity Charitable’s 2014 Giving Report:

• The average number of grants per giving account continued to rise, up from seven in 2012 to eight grants per year in 2013;
• The average grant size rose 6 percent from 2012 to 2013 to more than $4,000;
• The majority of incoming contributions are fully expended as grants within a decade — 91 percent of contributions to DAFs made between 1996 and 2000 were granted to charities by the end of 2010.

The pros
From a fundraising perspective, there are numerous pros to DAFs. For starters, donors who open DAFs are loyal givers.