I'm so pleased with myself I just had to gloat a little it feels so good. For years before I got old, fat and incontinent my wife and I offered guided climbing trips up Mt. Rainier for various fund raising @#$%& here in Seattle. It was not uncommon to raise 4-5000 dollars for an organization to take a party of 4 up the mountain. But as I said my old bod just isn't what it used to be. So when I started fly fishing we started taking people out on a guided float of a local river here in the NW and raise money for organizations and groups that way. Good write off for us too. A weekend float would bring in upwards of 5-600 bucks but I would also fork over typically 400+/- bucks for the drift boat rental, camping/launch fees, food , gas, etc. This year I decided to build a rod for an @#$%& Item since I've been on the austerity program since December. I bought a pretty good Tiger Eye blank off of @#$%& for about 15.00, a handle and reel seat from Cabelas for about 50.00 and a very sexy antique red agate stripping guide for 26.00 and probably another 10 bucks for guides and flex coat. Had a very nice custom decal made up from Decal Connection and 4-5 hours of random time allotted to it and I produced a very sweet little rod that sold for an astounding 600.00 at a local @#$%& for a school fundraiser. I'm very pleased.
BjR

Nice donation & sale! I would suspect @#$%& a rod lowers the liability 1,000x when compared to guiding and chartering a fishing trip on a rented boat. Good choice! Rodbuilders, donations, and charity @#$%& are almost tailor made for each other.

Jay

Great news! Good on ya! Only thing would have made it better would have been if you had bought your components from one of the sponsors here. Neal's beats @#$%& all to.................!!

Have built 5-6 rods mostly stand-ups to go to charity affairs for sick friends and children. The Money raised was never a Thought, but it felt great when the event was over

Save all your receipts and ask the organizers for a letter recognizing your donation. You can then claim a charitable donation on your taxes for the retail value you place on the donation. It's nice to "give back", but it's also nice to get a little something for your efforts besides good feelings.

Tim

I think I like the American system better...If I build and donate a rod for a fund-raisng/charitible @#$%&, the bidder who buys the item gets to claim the purchase price as the donation. The builder gets to claim squat, unless the builder is in the rod building business, and can claim the cost of building the rod as a business expense.
Or is it the same deal with private persons down your way, as well?

Ken Driedger Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think I like the American system better...If I
> build and donate a rod for a
> fund-raisng/charitible @#$%&, the bidder who
> buys the item gets to claim the purchase price as
> the donation. The builder gets to claim squat,
> unless the builder is in the rod building
> business, and can claim the cost of building the
> rod as a business expense.
> Or is it the same deal with private persons down
> your way, as well?


I believe the bidder can get a total write off of the dollar amount above the stated value of the rod. I valued the rod at $290.00 which included the costs for the components and some value for my time to produce it. So what ever is above that is deductible for the bidder. In this case the rod sold at @#$%& for close to $600.00. I valued it at $290.00 so the bidder can write off $310.00 because that is what goes as profit to the charity. I can write off only the expenses I put into producing the rod, I.E., the blank, guides, threads, epoxies, etc. Basically all of the components can be written off since I don't produce rods professionally for my income. If I did then the retail value of the rod can be deductible. But since I'm an occaisional rod building hack I can only write off the components and not my time.
It's not as big of a deduction for me as the expenses of renting a drift boat, camping fees, food etc. for a guided weekend trip that we usually donate to charities though. But in some ways it's more fun as I can see the results.

I'm on my third @#$%& rod. @#$%& is Saturday

I love it......

Haven't had one sell for $600, though.

Way to go...

Keith