Life Insurance Gifts

A gift of life insurance can easily leverage your current giving and is a unique way to realize your charitable goals. You may make a gift of life insurance to Wayne State by naming the university as irrevocable owner and beneficiary of the policy. A life insurance gift permits you to make a substantial gift to the university that may not otherwise be possible. A gift of insurance can be made in the following ways:

• Assign the ownership and beneficiary status of an existing policy to Wayne State University. This allows you an immediate federal income tax charitable deduction for the lesser of the policy's fair market value or net premiums paid. Amounts for any subsequent premiums due on the policy can be given to the university for payment, and these amounts are considered tax-deductible gifts.
• To give an existing policy to Wayne State University, contact your agent or the company to change the owner and beneficiary using your life insurance company’s forms. Send the completed forms to our office to complete the university’s portion and then forward to your agent.
• Purchase a new policy naming Wayne State University or the Wayne State University Foundation as owner and beneficiary. Gifts to the university for the amount of the premiums qualify as charitable deductions, provided you retain no rights to the policy.
• To donate a new policy, contact your life insurance agent and explain that the new policy will be a gift to Wayne State University, and ask him/her to contact us.
• Name Wayne State University as the beneficiary for a portion of the proceeds. Contact your agent or the company to add Wayne State as a beneficiary for a portion of the proceeds, and send us a copy of the form.

By establishing a planned gift such as a life insurance policy, you will be invited to join The Old Main Society, an organization created to recognize alumni and others who name Wayne State University in their estate plans. A future gift of $10,000 or more also qualifies you for recognition in the university’s prestigious Anthony Wayne Society. However, if you prefer to remain anonymous, we will keep your name and gift in strict confidence.