by Carolyn Schwaar

Caring for communities is an important part of the REALTOR ® association mission. Whether it’s to organize an annual fund-raiser or collect clothes for a local shelter, REALTORS ® look to their associations to focus the effort, unite the membership, and give of staff time, office space, and resources.

Associations often provide the initiative, support, and leadership behind the community-based charity efforts of hundreds of thousands of members.

“The benefits we receive from our charitable participation go beyond the strong pride and community participation that we receive; the benefit to our hearts is more than you can imagine,” says Linda Locke, association executive of the Concord Board of REALTORS ®, N.H. “We love to give individually, but as a group we come together and accomplish so much more.”

“Some people have the concept that REALTORS ® are extremely overpaid, greedy people,” says Linda Dunham, executive vice president of the Sioux Falls Board of REALTORS ®, S.D. “So any time we do community service, we advertise that fact in the local newspaper. We want the public to know that we do care, we do give back to the community, and we want our community to thrive and continue to grow.” The Sioux Falls Board has raised more than $20,000 this year for local shelters and homeless care.

In fact, according to an NAR survey conducted earlier this year, 93 percent of associations are involved in nonprofit groups that benefit everything from homeless shelters and cancer research to drug-abuse prevention and affordable housing development.

At many associations, charity programs and commitments are a key member service that actually attracts members and affiliate members.

“Because of the unusual working hours of REALTORS ®, it’s often difficult for them to get involved individually in community activities,” says Jeanette Newton, executive officer at the Dulles Area Association of REALTORS ®, Va. “We give them an opportunity to give back without having to join another organization.”

The association staff organizes charity programs to fit around REALTOR ® schedules, which means not holding activities on weekends or evenings when members are showing homes. “And even in this strong real estate market where time is at a premium, members spent hundreds of hours planning fund-raising golf tournaments, auctions, and raffles this year,” says Newton.

“The volunteers feel very good about what they do, and they have a great sense of pride in our ability to organize meaningful programs for the community,” says Newton. “We get some press on our activities, which is important to the members because it says something about how REALTORS ® support the community in which they work and live.” The Dulles Area Association raised more than $17,000 in 1999 for the Loudoun Abused Women’ s Shelter and Habitat for Humanity.

In the habit of helping
When asked what types of groups associations were involved with, most (68 percent) NAR survey respondents said that they partnered with Habitat for Humanity, a nonprofit housing organization that builds simple, affordable houses for the needy with the aid of volunteer labor and donations.

“Our annual auction raises nearly $10,000 a year, which goes mostly to Habitat,” says Laurenda Belk, association executive of the Zanesville Board of REALTORS ®, Ohio. And like so many other association executives who donate time and money to Habitat, Belk believes it’s a “natural fit” for her members to provide the opportunity of homeownership to a deserving family.

Earlier this year, the Jefferson City Area Board, Mo., partnered with the local Habitat chapter to build their community’s 26th Habitat home. Association staff, REALTORS ®, and affiliate members gave not only money and supplies to the program but also their time painting, hammering, and landscaping. “The groundbreaking took place in February, and four months later we had the privilege of seeing the American Dream of homeownership come true for the Joyce Jones family,” says Donna Stone, Jefferson Board’s executive vice president, who helped raise more than $36,000 for the project.

Homeownership is what we are all about, echoes Rives Bailey, president of the Charlottesville Area Association of REALTORS ®, Va. “A home is the foundation for our lives, and it’s our profound privilege to contribute to the community in so many ways,” he says. Charlottesville is well on its way to raising $7,500 for Habitat this year.

Common causes closer to home
The causes REALTOR ® associations commit to range from statewide home financing programs to helping a neighbor in need.

No charitable contribution is too small, and no association is too small to give back to its community, says Kathy Schulte, executive vice president of the Northwest Montana Association of REALTORS ®. The 400-member association gives to established local charities every year, but it has also raised money spontaneously for small but meaningful donations to individuals in need.

“All charities that we are involved with are a result of members bringing the cause forward and the directors agreeing that it is good for the community, and therefore good for us,” says Schulte.

“One year we raised enough money to pay for funeral expenses for a young woman who had just lost her mother. It was only a few thousand dollars, but it was really appreciated,” she says. One of the association’s high school projects involves sponsoring essay, poetry, and art contests on fair housing. The winners were awarded a couple hundred dollars for college, which was a real help to their families.

Those causes that touch the lives of individual REALTORS ® personally can have the largest positive impact on the membership and the community, says Cheryl Killgore, executive officer of the Outer Banks Association of REALTORS ®, N.C. “We turned our focus to raising money for the American Cancer Society and its Relay for Life when several REALTOR ® members were diagnosed with cancer,” she says. Outer Banks raised $45,226 for the American Cancer Society this year alone.

The recipients of association charity efforts are sometimes chosen by association staff, but more often, it’s an association’s board of directors or community service committee that selects a project that will most benefit the community and the members.

Every year, the 12-member charity committee of the Westmoreland REALTORS ® Association, Pa., chooses a new charity organization to work with. Last year it was the local chapter of the Alzheimer Association because of a personal connection. “The committee chose this project because one of our member’s husband was afflicted with Alzheimer’s,” says Marge Kennedy, association executive of Westmoreland. The association raised $5,000 through fund-raising golf tournaments, a Christmas social, and raffles, and all administrative details were handled through the association office.

“We believe our participation provides the community with a positive image of the REALTOR ® organization, and has given our members a good feeling of giving back to the community,” says Kennedy.

Charitable foundations
Giving on a large scale is what the Maine Association of R EALTORS® set out to achieve by establishing a charitable foundation to help fund affordable housing statewide.

According to the NAR survey, 19 percent of state and local REALTOR ® associations have charity foundations. And although their primary activities revolve around affordable housing, a few foundations focus on educational scholarships and most are funded through member donations and fund-raising.

The MAR Foundation Board of Directors awards 10 to 15 monetary grants annually to organizations in Maine that provide affordable housing. Local boards participate, too, by raising money for local housing groups. The amount is then matched dollar for dollar by MAR’s Affordable Housing Fund.

Local boards of REALTORS ® throughout Maine have raised money with holiday dances, golf tournaments, silent auctions, fashion shows, raffles, and yard and bake sales. Last year MAR granted $180,694 to affordable housing programs throughout the state.

With money contributed in part from the MAR foundation, the Mid-Coast Board in Maine was able to fund 17 grants to low-income homeowners in Waldo County last year. The grants funded roof repairs, replacement windows, and handrail installation to make steps safer for senior homeowners. The Mid-Coast board raised $13,414 last year for its affordable housing grants, a project that association executive Linda Davis says is bringing greater recognition to the association as a community leader in housing causes. “We have begun to reap the benefit of better community relations and image,” she says.

Another statewide funding effort is orchestrated by the Education Foundation of the Virginia Association of REALTORS ®, which funds education through several state nonprofit organizations, and works with the Virginia Housing Development Authority to provide resources for an “Economics of Homeownership” course. “More than a dozen REALTORS ® across the state assist in classroom teaching,” says Robert Authier, executive vice president.

“Through their classroom work, REALTORS ® are viewed by the children and their parents as integral to the homebuying process,” says Authier. By tying economic fundamentals with existing math and social studies courses, —along with programs geared to undergraduates and graduate students—the program reaches more than 500,000 people a year.

Fund-raisers & other charitable strategies
How REALTOR® associations raise money for their charitable efforts is as varied as the associations and the causes they champion. From networking socials and golf tournaments to charity escrow accounts and outright solicitations, REALTOR® associations are creative fund-raisers.

To raise money for Habitat for Humanity, the Charlottesville Area Association of REALTORS®, V A., asked all members to donate $10 each for every closing they have this year. REALTORS® also asked every professional they worked with on each transaction—such as the builder, attorney, home inspector, and mortgage broker—to do the same. Broker and manager members were asked to make a matching donation from the office for each donation made by a salesperson in that office. The idea of tying their contribution to their success, and publicizing it was very motivational, says Tracey Linkous, director of member services.

The Northeast Tarrant County Board of REALTORS® in Texas raises money in a bolder fashion than most; they drive office to office collecting cash and checks.

The board’s communications director, Rita Landry, says it’s become this easy to raise funds because of the projects the money goes to, particularly, funding for a women’s shelter. Those efforts earned the association a place on the ASAE’s Advance America Honor Role earlier this year.

For nine years, Landry’s board has supported Open Arms Home Inc., which runs shelters throughout the Fort Worth area for battered women and their children. “It’s a two-year program the women go through at the shelter, and a lot of them complete the program, get good jobs, and eventually buy their own homes,” Landry says.

A local NBC television affiliate heard about the board’s charity work at Open Arms Home and taped a visit to the shelter for a program that aired Thanksgiving eve 1999. Landry plays the tape for brokers on her annual donation visits, which, she says, makes a huge impact on them.

In Maine the REALTORS® Affordable Housing Fund receives its income from interest earned on real estate trust accounts. Members statewide deposit earnest money into special interest-bearing accounts at participating banks. “Our generous participating financial institutions (39 in all) pay interest on each balance and sweep the interest payments into the fund,” explains Suzanne Guild, coordinator of the Maine Association’s Charitable Foundation. In the past, the escrow money was held in non-interest-bearing accounts, but today nearly 75 percent of state members participate in the REALTORS ® Affordable Housing Fund escrow program.

“There’s a cooperative spirit built among REALTORS ® and other real estate and housing industry professionals through these ‘giving back’ opportunities to the communities where REALTORS ® live and work,” says Guild. And in some cases, the REALTORS ® Affordable Housing Fund serves to broaden the real estate market by creating activity in a segment that is traditionally difficult to serve, she says.

Networking for dollars
Another fund-raiser the Charlottesville association held for Habitat was the Raise the Roof black-tie gala, with a guest speaker, live performances, and a silent art auction. The advertising slogan was “Come listen to some good music, spill beer on your shoes, and raise some cash for Habitat for Humanity.” The gala was funded by sponsors and some seed money from the previous year’s event.

The holiday season is when most associations’ thoughts turn to giving. But for the REALTORS ® of the Sussex County Association in Delaware Christmas starts in October when their charity auction kicks off the holiday season. The proceeds from the auction—$25,000 - $30,000 annually—go to buy clothing and toys for nearly 300 needy children at local schools.

Dozens of members solicit for auction items, and last year sent out 300 letters to local businesses asking for donations. “More than 200 members attend the auction and purchase items,” says Denise Tatman, the association executive vice president. “Then another group of members and staff shop for the clothing and toys for the children, and wrap, and deliver them.

“We can usually get a big discount store to open its doors early just for us and earmark several registers for our carts,” says Tatman. “We buy a coat for almost every child, so we have to go to several stores in advance to get enough coats.”

The association’s charity committee chairperson puts in more than 120 hours throughout the year, and staff works on the project for the six months before Christmas. “It’s a very staff-intensive program,” says Tatman. “After the auction is over, the work begins again to get lists of names of children for the next year.”

Blood, sweat, and tears
Formal evening parties are a great way for members and others in the industry to network, yet they don’t provide the team-building experience or physical satisfaction of constructing homes or, another REALTOR ® favorite, semicompetitive sports.

The idea for a charity softball game to benefit the homeless was hatched when the Concord Board of
REALTORS ® and the Concord Area Home Builders in New Hampshire were planning a friendly softball game. A REALTOR ® member had been touched by a local newspaper article about a homeless man who died under the town’s bridge. Coincidentally, the executive director at the Friends Program Emergency Housing Shelter contacted the president of the Concord Home Builders that same day about having repairs done on the shelter.

“As the REALTORS ® talked and planned, our Softball Benefit Event was born, and has raised almost $20,000 in the last four years,” says Locke at the Condord Board.

The board’s work with the shelter doesn’t end with repairs. Over the years, REALTOR ® members have hosted Valentine’s Day and Easter parties there. “ And at Christmas, we took a wish list from everyone at the shelter,” says Locke. “Different offices took specific adults and children and bought them their wish list items. Other members brought in bags and boxes of toys and clothes for the kids.”

Although softball and golf may be the sport of choice for REALTOR ® fund-raisers across the country, in Savannah, Ga., they bowl. The annual REALTOR ® Bowl-A-Thon benefits Lifeline for Children, an organization that works with abused and neglected children. The Savannah Board of REALTORS ® raised nearly $2,000 last year.

And like so many of the board’s charity events, “once we do a project, it more than likely remains an annual event,” says Anne Paul Walters, association executive vice president. “About 10 percent of our members are physically involved in time donation to our charities, and 25 percent in monetary donations to our projects,” says Walters. “The reason our community service endeavors are so successful is that the members truly believe in giving back.”

This fall the Community Service Committee of the Mercer County Board of REALTORS ®, N.J., is sponsoring its second annual “Adopt-A-Room” project at the local youth crisis center for runaways, Anchor House. Member volunteers will scrub, clean, paint, decorate bedrooms, and transform an old storage closet into a counseling room for new residents, says Dana Burzymowski, the board’s director of marketing and communications.

While committee members collect contributions of old clothes, forgotten teddy bears, and dollars, association staff solicits local companies and stores for donations of paint and supplies, linens and towels, and winter clothes. “ The association continually organizes projects to benefit the community, and volunteer efforts are essential throughout the year,” Burzymowski adds.

Limitless rewards
There’s no doubt that associations and REALTORS ® benefit from building stronger communities.

“The most significant benefit for us is showing that we really mean what we say when we express concern about affordable housing and other key issues in our community,” says Don Klein at the Greater Nashville Association of REALTORS®, Tenn. “We’re committed to being involved in improving the community in which we live and work. It is a strong statement that we are willing to walk the walk, not just talk the talk.”

The Greater Nashville Association garners significant public recognition for its charity program through media attention, but Klein says, “I like to think we would do this kind of work because it is right—not simply because it makes us look good.”

How to Establish a Charitable Foundation

Establishing a charitable foundation can be one of the most rewarding projects undertaken by an association. It may also involve a substantial amount of research and legalities. At RealtorAE.com, there’s a wealth of resources accessible through the “Resources for AE & Volunteer Leaders” green button. This data, researched by NAR’s Virtual Library, should help those considering such an undertaking in deciding whether to do so—and how to accomplish this mission once that decision has been made.