FreeWill Accelerates Business Momentum to Begin 2024 as America's Most Popular Online Estate Planning Platform

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May 21, 2024, 09:00 ET

Surpasses one million free estate plans created since inception, supporting 1,500+ nonprofit partners, driving $10 billion to charity
Achieves key compliance milestones while growing enterprise partnerships

NEW YORK, May 21, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- FreeWill, a social-good enterprise at the nexus of philanthropy and estate planning, is pleased to share several key business milestones achieved through the first quarter of 2024 as the company accelerates its growth phase. Since its founding in 2017, FreeWill has continually delivered toward its mission of driving $1 trillion to charity as the largest transfer of wealth in human history takes place over the next 20 years, in part by meaningfully expanding access to estate planning tools for everyday Americans.

FreeWill offers a comprehensive yet free, BBB-accredited suite of estate planning products to consumers, including wills, beneficiary designations, advanced healthcare directives, and financial power of attorney documents, each of which is valid in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. FreeWill also offers trusts in all 50 states by way of its partners.

Notable milestones recently achieved by FreeWill include:

One million wills completed by consumers who otherwise wouldn't have written an estate plan, including more than 250,000 in 2023 alone
$10 billion in total commitments to charity, an increase of nearly 40% since the start of 2023
1,500+ nonprofit partners who work with FreeWill to help fundraise from transformative, non-cash asset pools, including bequests, stock gifts, crypto gifts, donor-advised funds and more, an increase of more than 40% since the start of 2023

As its products scale, FreeWill continues to iterate by making improvements to its product portfolio. Additions made over the past year to FreeWill's consumer offering include:

Supplemental Needs Trusts
Trust Restatements
Certification of Trusts
Takers of Last Resort

FreeWill is expanding its consumer reach through business development, establishing enterprise-level partnerships with insurers such as State Farm and Nationwide, as estate planning and life insurance purchases increasingly overlap. FreeWill is also proud to be working with leading financial advisors as it seeks to make estate planning part of the financial planning process.

Notably, FreeWill recently underwent a thorough and successful AICPA Service Organization Control (SOC) 2 Type II audit, conducted by Sensiba LLP. SOC2 Type II compliance underscores and verifies the company's continued commitment to privacy and security in safeguarding customer data. This comes after achieving SOC2 Type I compliance in 2022.

All FreeWill consumer products adhere to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), ensuring convenient accessibility to users with disabilities, at a level of WCAG 2.0 and above. Flagship products, including the Will, Trust and Beneficiary Designation tools, now exceed WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance, one of the top standards for accessibility.

"When we first set out to help nonprofits maximize the upcoming Great Wealth Transfer, where $84 trillion will go from aging parents to their children over the next 20 years, we realized we needed to bring comprehensive estate planning services to millions of Americans who were effectively locked out of the system," said Jenny Xia Spradling, co-CEO of FreeWill.

Spradling continued: "What we created – free to the user – quickly became the most popular estate planning tool in America and some of our largest nonprofit partners have already reported record years for realized gifts through planned giving, prompting them to explore further ways to partner with us. We're incredibly excited that we've been able to deliver a rare win-win in business that brings tangible impact for a variety of different stakeholders, helping fund good causes. At the same time, the Great Wealth Transfer is only just getting started, and so are we."

FreeWill's exemplary workplace culture was also recently recognized through the achievement of Most Loved Workplace^® certification, which focuses on positive and engaging workplace cultures.

About FreeWill

FreeWill is a social-good enterprise offering online tools that empower Americans to address commonly faced estate planning needs and make charitable donations in tax-advantaged ways, all for free. Through its partnerships with 1,500+ nonprofits who understand that major gifts often are part of estate plans, the company is also able to provide a comprehensive suite of estate planning and related tools to consumers free of cost. To date, FreeWill has generated more than $10 billion in planned and real-time gifts for more than 10,000 nonprofits while helping more than 1,000,000 consumers create wills and plan their estates.

Contact

Roger Sauerhaft
[email protected]

SOURCE FreeWill