Analysis finds ‘optimal wealth band’ of most valuable wills for UK charity gifts

Analysis of UK legacy gifts suggests that estates worth £1m-£3m (€1.2m-€3.4m) are the most impactful for charities.

Those estates make up just 27% of total estate wealth, but deliver 33% of all charitable bequests, according to new data from Legacy Futures and Smee & Ford, both consultancies working in the wills and legacy giving space.

The new analysis notes that while estates worth more than £3m hold 23% of assets, they contribute only 12% of charitable bequests.

It also shows that giving correlates with wealth – just 6% of estates under £100,000 include a charitable gift, increasing to 29% of estates over £5 million.

However, wealthier donors prefer to make specific cash gifts in their wills, while smaller estates are more likely to include a residuary gift. Residuary gifts, which involve promising a percentage of the estate after relevant debt, taxes and other specific payments are made, tend to more generous than cash gifts.

This new analysis was released by Legacy Futures and Smee & Ford to support the launch of Legacy Navigator, an online platform to support charities in their legacy fundraising. Its features include real-time legacy tracking; benchmarking tools; and access to webinars, training and insight reports.

Ashley Rowthorn, CEO of Legacy Futures, says:

“The £1-3m sweet spot is where legacy fundraising delivers maximum impact and charities looking to grow income from gifts in wills can’t afford to overlook the power of the mid-value donor.”

The new analysis builds on data released by Legacy Futures earlier this year, which showed that legacy gifts provided a total of £4.5bn to UK charities in 2024. The organisation expects that to more than double to £10bn by 2050.

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