Creative Fundraising for your School or Cause
In 1995, Michael Pink and Sharon Porter initiated a business model as a proprietary program of Chicago-based MAP Real Estate. Through this program, more than $275,000 was donated to nonprofits. Over time, Michael and Sharon recognized the opportunity to significantly scale the impact of their model. In 2007, they established an independent nonprofit entity so that other real estate professionals and their clients could also generate philanthropy through business. They named this social enterprise “Investing In Communities.” In May 2010, Investing In Communities officially launched with a $20,000 distribution to a single nonprofit. As of December 2011, IIC has distributed over $119,000 to 33 nonprofits.
This is a short story to introduce a new tool called Investing In Communities® (IIC) that’s free for individuals and companies to use to help the organizations that are helping our kids and our communities.
With $5,000 of IIC funding, Dreams for Kids was able to help 32 at-risk youth learn to become caring leaders. With $2,000 of IIC funding, SIDS Illinois was enabled to purchase new cribs to use in their educational outreach program. Bear Necessities used the $1,000 of funding they received to help provide customized experiences for children battling cancer. With $4,796 of IIC funding PAWS was able to save more furry friends. IIC enabled Chicago Bilingual Nurse Consortium to provide Virginia with a scholarship, so she could complete her studies. And, Centro San Bonafacio was enabled to initiate a stipend program for its most talented doulas.
The source of this unrestricted funding is the innovative Investing In Communities model, which transforms competition among real estate agents into support for their clients’ favorite charities – while it helps the agents differentiate themselves and make more money.
Here are the basics of how it works. Real estate professionals join IIC, as Members, by signing a pledge to make available at least 10% of their commission on IIC transactions for their client to direct to the charity of the client’s choice. Or, you can request, as a condition for winning the assignment, that the agent you want to work with joins you “investing in communities.”
So, now that you know how it works the question is, how well does it work? The quick answer, it works really really well. This model can facilitate any size transaction ranging from A.R.T. receiving $340 to a deal in which Urban Partnership Bank raised $42,000 for 15 different charities. Just since May, 2010, Investing In Communities has distributed over $123,000 to worthy charities. And IIC is 100% win/win/win. IIC is free for individual and corporate clients to use. IIC is free for nonprofits to use. IIC makes more money for its agent Members.
To learn more about giving the free gift of IIC to your favorite nonprofit, company, school, individual, or to a real estate agent, visit us at www.iiconline.org.
Posted on August 06, 2012 at 12:32 PM
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