How much does Makoff Family Foundation give?

Makoff Family Foundation reported 12 grants totaling $153,000 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 29 and 38 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.

What does Makoff Family Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are International (25%), Health (20%), Education (15%).

Who are Makoff Family Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: United States Fund for Unicef ($66k), William J Brennan Center for Justice Inc ($55k), The Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research ($46k).

Does Makoff Family Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 3% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Makoff Family Foundation accept unsolicited applications?

Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

Which funders back the same organizations as Makoff Family Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Liberty Hill Foundation, Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc, The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc.

Where is Makoff Family Foundation based?

Makoff Family Foundation is based in CA.

Makoff Family Foundation

Makoff Family Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Makoff Family Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$153k

Granted FY2025still arriving

Grants FY2025still arriving

States reached

$21k

Largest

01What it funds

01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

International$251kHealth$200kEducation$157kCivil Rights$80kArts & Culture$54kCrime & Legal$46kYouth Development$44kEnvironment$39kOther$0

02FY2025 · 12 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2025

Under $10k4 grants · $22k
$10k–50k8 grants · $131k

$10,000

Median grant

States reached

$2.4M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
Cedars-Sinai	$21,000
Planned Parenthood	$20,000
Michael J Fox Fdn	$20,000
Brennan Center for Justice	$20,000
PBS	$20,000
Individual grant recipient	$10,000
Sandals Fdn Jamaica Emergency Relief	$10,000
Individual grant recipient	$10,000
Doctors without Borders	$7,000
Brave Trails	$5,000
Tree Academy	$5,000
Individual grant recipient	$5,000

02The need

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY17–24, $38k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 91% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

How this is measured

Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.

Which US states its grants reach

How this is measured

US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.

Where the work is directed

The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.

About 8% of Makoff Family Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address. By recipient address, 52% of the giving stays in CA; by stated purpose, 42%.

Makoff Family Foundationlessmore of its giving

Placed by recipient address · 18% directed abroad (not shown)

How this is measured

Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the funder’s own 990 grant descriptions.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

90%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$913k · 59 repeat orgs$106k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +21% since the first grant, against +11% for those funded once.

59 repeat relationships: 9 still active in FY2025, 50 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$913k

$81k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+21%

+11%

Still filing today

54%

19%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 84% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $25k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

EducationInternationalHealthHuman ServicesCivil RightsCrime & LegalOther

How this is measured

First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

Backed again, and grew

UNITED STATES FUND FOR UNICEF
8× · 2017–2024 · $66k · revenue +76%
THE MICHAEL J FOX FOUNDATION FOR PARKINSON'S RESEARCH
7× · 2019–2025 · $46k · revenue +338%
CEDARS-SINAI MEDICAL CENTER
6× · 2020–2025 · $35k · revenue +55%

Funded once

UF
UCLA FOUNDER'S FUND
one grant, 2021 · $13k
ME
Morrocco Earthquake WCK UNICEF
2× · 2023–2024 · $10k
Feeding America
one grant, 2021 · $10k · revenue +23%

How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

The Population Council Inc

We generate ideas, produce evidence, and design solutions to improve the lives of underserved populations around the world. we take a multidisciplinary, intergenerational, life-cycle approach that contributes to (see schedule o)four global…

International

The Union of Concerned Scientists Inc

The union of concerned scientists puts rigorous, independent science into action, developing solutions and advocating for a healthy, safe, and just future.

International

Actionaid Usa

Actionaid is an international network building a just, equitable, and sustainable world in solidarity with communities on the frontlines of poverty and injustice. actionaid usa is the u.s. branch of actionaid international, which works in…

Social Science

International Crisis Group

Crisis group works to prevent and resolve deadly conflict around the world by informing and influencing the perceptions and actions of policymakers and other key conflict actors. to this end, we endeavour to talk to all sides and provide…

International

Washington Office On Latin America

To advance human rights and social justice in the americas.

International

Project Drawdown

Project drawdown's mission is to drive meaningful climate action by advancing science-based solutions and strategies. project drawdown's work is focused on three pillars: science - advancing science-based climate solutions and strategies;…

Education

Pew Research Center

Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan "fact tank" that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world. Pew Research Center generates a foundation of facts that enriches the public dialogue and…

Social Science

Friends of the Earth

Friends of the earth strives for a more healthy and just world by defendng the environment and human health while advancing social and economic justice by conducting research and education, transforming the economy so it protects the…

Environment

Public Health Institute

Public health institute generates and promotes research, leadership and partnerships to build capacity for strong public health policy, programs, systems and practices.

Health

We Are Family Foundation

The we are family foundation celebrates the vision of a global family by creating and supporting programs that inspire and educate people about mutual respect, understanding and appreciation of cultural diversity.

Civil Rights

Committee to Protect Journalists Inc

The committee to protect journalists promotes press freedom worldwide and defends the right of journalists to report the news safely and without fear of reprisal. cpj ensures the free flow of news and commentary by taking action wherever…

Civil Rights

American Psychological Association

American psychological association is a national membership organization created to promote the advancement, communication, and application of psychological science and knowledge to benefit society and improve lives. apa fulfills these…

Social Science

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Medecins Sans Frontieres Usa Inc; the most unlike its peers is The Pilot Light Foundation. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

05the grantee network

38 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 38 of the 84 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

38/38

Grantees still filing

24/38

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$535,190International$153,060Education$134,000Health$106,750Human Services$37,500Civil Rights$28,000Environment$25,500

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Liberty Hill FoundationCA13.3× affinity4 shared granteesties to 7 of 7Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Liberty Hill Foundation · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Paypal Charitable Giving Fund · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

How this is measured

Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Makoff Family Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Makoff Family Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

2get no government money at all

8report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely on government for over half their income

⤢ axis zoomed · 0–90%

typical government reliance, FY20–25

How this is measured

Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12 to 24 months.

Play a game based on Makoff Family’s filings →

More from the funding graph

The unnamed billions

grants reported with no recipient in the public record

The regranting layer

51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer

The DAF merry-go-round

$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds

The endowment market

who holds foundation money, and what just moved

The camps

funders cluster by geography, not ideology

By state

where grant money is based, and what stays home