Toronto-based PhilanthPro Solutions launched new financial planning software designed to help donors plan their giving. Founded by Nicholas Palahnuk, investment advisor and senior portfolio manager with the Palahnuk Group at BMO Nesbitt Burns in Toronto, PhilanthPro helps financial advisors create and manage goals-based financial plans for charitable accounts.
“It’s crazy that we don’t have tools to help people give their money away,” said Palahnuk, who is also CEO of PhilanthPro. “Our whole industry is set up to help people to accumulate wealth.”
Palahnuk has been an advisor for over 12 years with BMO Nesbitt Burns and has primarily helped clients accumulate wealth, but he discovered the pain of not having financial planning software for giving money away when he founded his own charitable foundation.
“We can kind of force these things into traditional planning software, but it’s not ideal. The taxes are wrong, it doesn’t account for grant planning . . . and it’s not easy to use,” he said.
PhilanthPro’s features include a grant planning tool to help donors keep track of grant commitments, a governance and records portal, and a charitable relationship management system. Advisors can create hypothetical scenarios, for example, to show how a large one-off deposit or donation would affect future giving.
PhilanthPro collaborated with accounting firm Grant Thornton LLP to ensure that the CRA-required minimum distribution of funds is accurately modeled for grant planning. In addition to showing minimal distribution over a time horizon, PhilanthPro can also calculate optimal distribution and perpetuity scenarios. The software will automatically update when CRA rules change, Palahnuk said.
After spending a year performing user testing with advisors and philanthropists, he said there is “a whole army of people that are very interested in the software.” PhilanthPro has been opening accounts in the first week of its launch and Palahnuk said he’s in discussions with wealth management firms about adopting the software.
PhilanthPro is suitable for clients who have charitable accounts like foundations, trusts or donor-advised funds, Palahnuk said. Pricing ranges from $3,000 to $5,000 a year depending on client needs.
It is also available in the U.S. and designed to work with the American tax system.
Source: Advisor.ca
