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You see pitches everywhere: donate your car to charity! Help a good cause and get a big tax gains and losses at the same time! It's a win-win for everyone!
Sometimes, however, it is the broker who more wins.
vehicle donations generated $ 23 million in California last year, but charities received less than half of that - 47.2 percent ($ 11 million), according to data from the general prosecutor.
Orange County, which was much worse.
A total of $ 2.9 million was raised through donations vehicles in 2010, but only $ 400,336 of it - a tiny 13.8 percent - actually went to local charities.
That is largely because one charity - Solutions for breast cancer in Costa Mesa - raised the overwhelming majority ($ 2,640,000), and got only a fraction of the profits ($ 264,045).
Other local charities, while operating on a smaller scale, did much better:
Rescue Mission Orange County in Tustin won 68.4 percent of the amount collected through vehicle donations.
The Laguna Beach Community Clinic and Catholic Charities of Orange County in Santa Ana each got 67.5 percent.
The Orange County Council, Boy Scouts of America in Santa Ana is 62.1 percent.
The Boys and Girls Club on the south coast of San Clemente won 61.1 percent.
The American Red Cross of Orange County in Santa Ana is 59.9 percent.
The KOCE TV Foundation in Santa Ana is 58.2 percent.
(See details in dollar terms in the 32 local charities had vehicle donation programs in the lists at the end of this story.)
The key difference between getting 68 percent, and get 10 percent, is in the contract of each charity signed with the foreign company that processes your vehicle donations.
