December 2, 2025 • 6 mins
Amy talks with the host of ‘How to Money’ Joel Larsgaard talking about how to find trustworthy charities and being responsible while deciding to be charitable.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We mentioned that today is Giving Tuesday, and I think
that we all want to help in some way, right, Well,
we know that with Katerina's Club, one hundred percent of
what you donate goes directly to the kids, which is
even better because even with the best charities, you know,
there's administration fees. They do have to pay for what
they do in some form. But with Katerina's Club, it's
(00:22):
your donations that go directly to the kids. So great,
so great, right, But if you have other other charities
that you want to participate in and give two and help,
you know, there are good ones out there and there
are bad ones out there. And that's why we wanted
to talk with the host of How to Money on KFI,
Joel lars Guard this morning. You can hear them Sundays
(00:43):
from noon to two. And Joel tell us about like
how we can make sure that what we donate is
going to the place intended.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Yeah, that's that's a great question, Amy. And this is
the day in particular, and this is the time of
year where you're going to get requests for donations and
a lot of those requests are gonna pull itt your
heartstrings understandably, so and I'm all for generosity, right while
you're trying to build wealth and be smart with your money,
(01:15):
like giving money away as you have done well with
your own money is such a beautiful thing. But this
time of year you will find people trying to take
advantage of your generosity, of your desire to help people
in your community or to give to causes that resonate
with you. And and so it's really important to make
(01:37):
sure that you have vetted charities that you're considering giving
to before you just I mean, I'm gonna say, write
a check. Nobody writes a check anymore, but before you
click the donor right, So before you do that, make
sure you've taken a look behind, you know, peep behind
the curtain to see what's going on with that charity.
(01:57):
And so there are websites that can help you do that.
There's charity navigator dot org is one of my favorites.
There's charity watch. Those are great websites, so you can
like search by charity name and you can look to see, Okay,
what are the financial metrics of this charity? How much
of the money that they're raising is going to the
cause that I care about? Because there are some charities
(02:19):
where the overhead is insane and you're like, wait a second,
this a lot of the money that they're raising is
actually going just to pay staff members or something like that.
And let's be honest, the smaller the charity, oftentimes that
is more the case. And so you want to judge
on metrics like impact as well. But it's really important
to look under the hood to make sure one that
(02:41):
the organization is legitimate and then two that your money
is actually going to have an impact.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Yeah, and I love that they have like charity Navigator
because I know that I was considering donating to it.
It was a firefighter's fund. They had called and they
were telling us about what they do, and I was like, oh,
that sounds great. You know, of course we want to
help the firefight. And we looked at it and like
eighty percent of the money did not go to the firefighters.
It was crazy how little actually went to the people
(03:09):
it was supposed to go to.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
And you'll find that is the case. I won't say
more often than not, but more often than you'd like
to like to think. And there was a couple of
years ago there was I saw one from a football player,
a quarterback very prominent person, and you're like, well, that's
charity's got to be legitimate, And you know, it turns
out he had his friends on the payroll and so
(03:32):
much of the money they were raising was going to
pay exorbitant salaries. And you can find that stuff out
by looking at those websites. It's really important. I think
the other thing I want to stress is that you're
going to see more like in person requests, whether it's
a knock at your door, whether it's shopping at the
grocery store, people are going to say, hey, will you
donate to this cause? I don't want to seem scrooge
like this holiday season, but my answer is essentially always, hey,
(03:55):
do you have some literature? Can you give me something
sick so that I can I'm not going to give today.
I like to pre plan my giving and so that
I know where I'm giving and when I'm giving and
how much I'm giving, And so it doesn't mean that
I'm not willing to give impulsively at times like I am.
I have some money set aside even for that. But
I think there is that sort of pull sometimes in
(04:16):
person where you give maybe because you're you feel guilted
into it. And if you really love that, cause you
know that, cause you're happy to give, go for it.
I just want people to be able to say, actually,
you know, let me think about that. Can you tell
me more about your charity? Where can I look up
more information so you don't feel like you have to
give in the moment and that you can actually like
(04:37):
do your due diligence to give effectively.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Yep, okay. And then I want to touch on really
quick donor advised funds. I don't know this term. What
is this? You know that it's one of your favorites.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Yes, oh, I love donor advice funds and for multiple reasons.
So donor advice funds are and they used to kind
of be for the ultra wealthy, and they used to
be have higher expenses, and so for or the average
Joe who wanted to give money away, it just didn't
make sense. But costs have gone down precipitously. My favorite
donor advice fund provider is one called Daffy. Daffy dot
(05:10):
org is the website to check it them out. But
what you can do is essentially funnel all your charitable
giving through one account. And so one of the biggest
paint in the butts is at the beginning of next year,
when all your giving data starts to come in or
the end of this year and you have to compile.
Let's say you've given to ten or twelve of your
favorite charities, you have to keep up with all the paperwork. Well,
(05:33):
if you give to those charities through your donor of
buys funds, it's one piece of paper, like it is
one thing, because all your giving has been funneled through
that one account. The other cool thing about donor ad
buys funds is that you can, similar to how you're
growing money in your four O one K or your
roth Ira, you can invest those dollars to give in
the future as those dollars grow. So that's one of
(05:55):
my other the other coolest things about donor advice funds.
If you are into kind of optimize your money and
you want to be able to give even more down
the road, donor advice funds are a really cool way
to do that. And again, Daffy is my favorite because
it has the lowest costs, it's got a great interface.
But if you're keen on giving and growing kind of
like a giving nest egg, donor advice funds are an
(06:17):
awesome choice.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
All right. That's Joel Larsgard, the host of How to
Money on KFI Sundays from noon to two. You can
also follow Joel at how to Money. Joel, thanks so much,
Joel
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Of course, thanks Amy,
We mentioned that today is Giving Tuesday, and I think
that we all want to help in some way, right, Well,
we know that with Katerina's Club, one hundred percent of
what you donate goes directly to the kids, which is
even better because even with the best charities, you know,
there's administration fees. They do have to pay for what
they do in some form. But with Katerina's Club, it's
(00:22):
your donations that go directly to the kids. So great,
so great, right, But if you have other other charities
that you want to participate in and give two and help,
you know, there are good ones out there and there
are bad ones out there. And that's why we wanted
to talk with the host of How to Money on KFI,
Joel lars Guard this morning. You can hear them Sundays
(00:43):
from noon to two. And Joel tell us about like
how we can make sure that what we donate is
going to the place intended.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Yeah, that's that's a great question, Amy. And this is
the day in particular, and this is the time of
year where you're going to get requests for donations and
a lot of those requests are gonna pull itt your
heartstrings understandably, so and I'm all for generosity, right while
you're trying to build wealth and be smart with your money,
(01:15):
like giving money away as you have done well with
your own money is such a beautiful thing. But this
time of year you will find people trying to take
advantage of your generosity, of your desire to help people
in your community or to give to causes that resonate
with you. And and so it's really important to make
(01:37):
sure that you have vetted charities that you're considering giving
to before you just I mean, I'm gonna say, write
a check. Nobody writes a check anymore, but before you
click the donor right, So before you do that, make
sure you've taken a look behind, you know, peep behind
the curtain to see what's going on with that charity.
(01:57):
And so there are websites that can help you do that.
There's charity navigator dot org is one of my favorites.
There's charity watch. Those are great websites, so you can
like search by charity name and you can look to see, Okay,
what are the financial metrics of this charity? How much
of the money that they're raising is going to the
cause that I care about? Because there are some charities
(02:19):
where the overhead is insane and you're like, wait a second,
this a lot of the money that they're raising is
actually going just to pay staff members or something like that.
And let's be honest, the smaller the charity, oftentimes that
is more the case. And so you want to judge
on metrics like impact as well. But it's really important
to look under the hood to make sure one that
(02:41):
the organization is legitimate and then two that your money
is actually going to have an impact.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
Yeah, and I love that they have like charity Navigator
because I know that I was considering donating to it.
It was a firefighter's fund. They had called and they
were telling us about what they do, and I was like, oh,
that sounds great. You know, of course we want to
help the firefight. And we looked at it and like
eighty percent of the money did not go to the firefighters.
It was crazy how little actually went to the people
(03:09):
it was supposed to go to.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
And you'll find that is the case. I won't say
more often than not, but more often than you'd like
to like to think. And there was a couple of
years ago there was I saw one from a football player,
a quarterback very prominent person, and you're like, well, that's
charity's got to be legitimate, And you know, it turns
out he had his friends on the payroll and so
(03:32):
much of the money they were raising was going to
pay exorbitant salaries. And you can find that stuff out
by looking at those websites. It's really important. I think
the other thing I want to stress is that you're
going to see more like in person requests, whether it's
a knock at your door, whether it's shopping at the
grocery store, people are going to say, hey, will you
donate to this cause? I don't want to seem scrooge
like this holiday season, but my answer is essentially always, hey,
(03:55):
do you have some literature? Can you give me something
sick so that I can I'm not going to give today.
I like to pre plan my giving and so that
I know where I'm giving and when I'm giving and
how much I'm giving, And so it doesn't mean that
I'm not willing to give impulsively at times like I am.
I have some money set aside even for that. But
I think there is that sort of pull sometimes in
(04:16):
person where you give maybe because you're you feel guilted
into it. And if you really love that, cause you
know that, cause you're happy to give, go for it.
I just want people to be able to say, actually,
you know, let me think about that. Can you tell
me more about your charity? Where can I look up
more information so you don't feel like you have to
give in the moment and that you can actually like
(04:37):
do your due diligence to give effectively.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Yep, okay. And then I want to touch on really
quick donor advised funds. I don't know this term. What
is this? You know that it's one of your favorites.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Yes, oh, I love donor advice funds and for multiple reasons.
So donor advice funds are and they used to kind
of be for the ultra wealthy, and they used to
be have higher expenses, and so for or the average
Joe who wanted to give money away, it just didn't
make sense. But costs have gone down precipitously. My favorite
donor advice fund provider is one called Daffy. Daffy dot
(05:10):
org is the website to check it them out. But
what you can do is essentially funnel all your charitable
giving through one account. And so one of the biggest
paint in the butts is at the beginning of next year,
when all your giving data starts to come in or
the end of this year and you have to compile.
Let's say you've given to ten or twelve of your
favorite charities, you have to keep up with all the paperwork. Well,
(05:33):
if you give to those charities through your donor of
buys funds, it's one piece of paper, like it is
one thing, because all your giving has been funneled through
that one account. The other cool thing about donor ad
buys funds is that you can, similar to how you're
growing money in your four O one K or your
roth Ira, you can invest those dollars to give in
the future as those dollars grow. So that's one of
(05:55):
my other the other coolest things about donor advice funds.
If you are into kind of optimize your money and
you want to be able to give even more down
the road, donor advice funds are a really cool way
to do that. And again, Daffy is my favorite because
it has the lowest costs, it's got a great interface.
But if you're keen on giving and growing kind of
like a giving nest egg, donor advice funds are an
(06:17):
awesome choice.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
All right. That's Joel Larsgard, the host of How to
Money on KFI Sundays from noon to two. You can
also follow Joel at how to Money. Joel, thanks so much,
Joel
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Of course, thanks Amy,
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