Partners with Modest Needs
Learn About Modest Needs Frequently Asked Questions Questions And Answers for Non-Profit Organizations
This FAQ sheet contains answers to the questions that persons working with Non-Profit Organizations ask most often about the application process at Modest Needs.
If you're considering applying for a Non-Profit grant on behalf of your organization from Modest Needs, you should review this information BEFORE submitting an application.
Your organization is eligible to apply for a Non-Proft Grant from Modest Needs' donors if:
Absolutely Not. All of Modest Needs' services are provided at no cost to our applicants, thanks to the generous support of our donors.
However, if you find our services valuable to your organization and personally wish to support our work, on behalf of our many individual and non-profit applicants, we would certainly appreciate your kindness and generosity.
To learn more about our Non-Profit Grants, please follow this link to read about our grant types and eligibility guidelines. The details of Modest Needs' Non-Profit Grants appear as grant type four on that page.
Please keep in mind that grants we offer at Modest Needs come with no strings attached and do not ever have to be repaid.
Currently, the amount of the maximum grant that a Non-Profit Organization can request from Modest Needs is $5,000.00.
However, when applying for a Modest Needs grant, you should keep in mind that the less you request from Modest Needs, the greater the chances that Modest Needs' donors will opt to fund your organization's grant request.
Yes. Presently, Modest Needs allows Non-Profit Organizations to place up to five separate grant requests at a time for consideration by our donors.
There is currently no limit to the number of times that a Non-Profit Organization can receive a grant from Modest Needs' donors.
However, you should bear in mind that, historically, the more often a Non-Profit Organization applies for a grant from Modest Needs' donors, the less likely our donors are to fund grant requests from that organization, particularly if that organization has received grants from Modest Needs' donors one or more times in the past.
The first step in applying for a Non-Profit Grant from Modest Needs Foundation is to register your organization with us.
You can complete our Non-Profit Organization registration form in ten minutes or less, but before completing the form, you should have the supporting documentation that we request from all Non-Profit Organizations scanned and ready for upload to our secure server.
You can see a complete list of the documentation that we request from non-profits upon registration by viewing our Non-Profit Registration Form
Once you've successfully registered your Non-Profit Organization with Modest Needs and your registration has been approved, you are free to submit as many grant applications as you like, subject to the limits described above. However, you may apply for assistance from Modest Needs ONLY by completing our online grant application.
To get started, just click the 'Apply for Help' link located on Modest Needs' main menu, above, and complete our short pre-qualification questionnaire.
Your organization may have only ONE active non-profit registration with Modest Needs. If you attempt to create a second registration for an organization that is already registered with us, our system will detect the duplicate and disallow the new registration.
In the event that you forget your login information, you should NOT attempt to create a new registration for your organization. Instead, please visit our Login Help Page to retrieve your organization's login information.
If you need additional help to retrieve your organization's login information, you are welcome to contact us directly, and we'll be happy to help you.
In order to register an organization with Modest Needs, you must be either an employee of that organization, or your name must appear on the Form 990 / 990EZ (or Canadian equivalent) that your organization most recently submitted.
If your organization is not required to file a Form 990 / 990EZ or its Canadian equivalent, your name must appear on the organization's incorporating documents in order for you to register your organization with Modest Needs.
Unfortunately, persons who volunteer with your organization or persons unaffiliated with your organization in any official capacity may NOT register your organization with Modest Needs.
No. If you would like to apply for assistance from Modest Needs for yourself or your household, you'll first need to register with us as an individual applicant.
To create an applicant registration for your household, simply visit our registration page and complete the appropriate registration form.
You will then be able to apply for help on behalf of yourself or your household using the login and password associated with your Modest Needs applicant account.
In order for your organization's registration with Modest Needs to remain active, you must update your registration data annually.
Modest Needs will send an email to your organization's designated registrant reminding him or her to update your organization's information and instructions on how to do so approximately one month before your Non-Profit Organization's registration is set to expire.
At Modest Needs, we evaluate all applications for assistance using the four-step process described below:
This depends on many factors, including the speed with which you - the applicant - respond to our requests for documentation and other information we need to move your application through our grant making process, and how quickly our donors allocate to your application all of the points that it needs in order to receive a Modest Needs grant.
It is our goal to process everything that we receive from our applicants (new applications and complete documentation packets) on a 'same day' basis. This is occasionally not possible, for example, during times when we're experiencing a heavy volume of new applications. In that case, it may take up to two business days to process a new application or completed documentation packet.
However, you'll receive a daily status update from Modest Needs to let you know where your application stands every day that it is active. You can also check your Modest Needs Personal Page to see the status of your application at any time.
In a best-case scenario, it is possible to fund an application on the same day we receive it. However, our experience suggests that it takes a minimum of seven days for an application to be funded after it has entered donor review.
The best way to 'speed up' the review of your application is to get all your documentation to Modest Needs as quickly as possible, and exactly as requested.
If you are prepared to provide us with the documentation we request from you within one business day, your application can be in donor review within one business day of our receiving your application.
Under those circumstances, it is possible for our donors to fund an application as quickly as the same day, though it usually takes a minimum of 7 to 10 days for an application of high interest to be fully funded by our donors.
If your organization needs help more quickly than that, Modest Needs is probably not the best funding resource for you.
Chances are you haven't yet marked your documentation 'ready for review.'
Once you've uploaded all of the documentation that Modest Needs has requested from you, you MUST click the button that says 'Mark my documentation ready for review.' Doing this signals your Client Advocacy Specialist that it's time to review your documentation.
If you do not click the button 'Mark my documents ready for review,' then your Client Advocacy Specialist will not be notified that your documents are ready, and your application will probably just 'sit there' until it expires. To avoid this, PLEASE be sure to mark your documents ready for review once you've uploaded all of the documentation to support your application.
Throughout the application process, your Client Advocacy Specialist will communicate with you EXCLUSIVELY via email, and through notations that will appear on your Modest Needs Personal Page.
For this reason, it is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL that you check the email account attached to your Non-Profit Organization's registration with Modest Needs AND your Modest Needs Personal Page DAILY for as long as your application is active at Modest Needs.
Every day, we'll send you an email update to let you know the status of your application and - if applicable - how many more points you need to receive in order for your application to be fully funded by Modest Needs.
You received the name of and contact information for your Client Advocacy Specialist in the 'acknowledgement' letter that came to you via email as soon as you submitted your new application.
If you've misplaced that email message, you can find your Client Advocacy Specialist's name and contact information using the chart below:
| If you live in one of the following states: | Then your Client Advocacy Specialist is: | Your CAS is in the office (M-F, Eastern Time) |
To Contact via Telephone, dial (212) 463-7042 and ask for extension: |
For After-Hours Voicemail dial (212) 463-7042) and enter extension: |
Contact Your CAS via Email: |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FL, KY, ME, MA, MI, MS, MO, NE, NH, NJ, NM, ND, RI, or TN | Angela Schmidt | 9:00am-5:00pm | 15 | 15 | Click to Contact Ms. Schmidt |
| AL, AZ, CA, CO, HI, ID, KS, MT, NV, NY, OH, OK, OR, PA, SD, UT, WA, WY, Guam, Puerto Rico or the Virgin Islands | Ilona Melyokhin | 1:00pm-5:00pm | 16 | 16 | Click to Contact Ms. Melyokhin |
| AL, AR, CT, DE, DC, IL, IN, IO, MD, MN, NC, SC, VT, VA, WV, or WI | Sarah Martin | 9:00am-1:00pm | 17 | 17 | Click to contact Ms. Martin |
| LA, TX, or any Canadian Province | Fawn Volkert | 9:00am-5:00pm | 12 | 12 | Click to contact Ms. Volkert |
| GA | John Arenberg | 9:00am-5:00pm | 12 | 12 | Click to contact Mr. Arenberg |
One favor to ask: please do NOT call your Client Advocacy Specialist simply to check the status of your application. This information is already reported to you on your Modest Needs Personal Page and in the daily status email that we send to you every day that your application is active with Modest Needs.
Calling your Client Advocacy Specialist simply to ask questions already answered on your Personal Page slows the application review process for everyone.
If you're not receiving a daily status update from Modest Needs, then our letters to you are probably being blocked by your SPAM filter.
To fix this problem, simply add the domain 'modestneeds.org' to your safe-senders list.
If you're not sure how to add a domain to your safe-senders list, please contact your email provider for instructions on how to do so.
In order for Modest Needs to be self-sustaining, we must add a small 'fulfillment charge' to every application we receive.
The fulfillment charge, which is determined by our system automatically depending on the total cost to fund your application in full, represents the cost of providing our services to you, the applicant and performing the due-diligence that gives our donors the confidence to invest in your application in the first place.
By adding this small fulfillment charge (it averages about 20% per application), we can offer all of our services at NO COST to our applicants while providing for the self-sustainability of Modest Needs.
Pending applications from Non-Profit Organizations (applications for which we have requested but not received supporting documentation) remain active for 10 days from the date that they are updated to 'pending' status..
If, after ten days, you have not provided us with the documentation that we've requested in support of your application, that application will be closed due to insufficient documentation, and you'll need to start the grant application process over again.
Generally, pre-qualified applications for assistance from Non-Profit Organizations remain in donor review at Modest Needs for 90 days.
If, after 90 days, your application has not received all of the points that it needs from our donors in order for us to approve your grant request, your application expires and becomes 'unfunded.' At that point, if your organization still would like to pursue its grant request, you're welcome to resubmit your application with updated documentation for further consideration from our donors.
While you're welcome to submit an application for help as many times as you like, if the same application goes unfunded twice at Modest Needs, we wouldn't recommend that you submit it a third time, as this generally indicates that, for reasons beyond our control, our donors have determined that they are not willing to make the investment necessary to fully fund that particular grant request.
At Modest Needs, we limit the number applications that we consider at any given time to (roughly) the number of applications that we have the funding to address.
We do this so that we can provide the personalized assistance for which we are known to each of our applicants.
If you attempt to access our Non-Profit application form and receive the message 'There are no open application slots available at this time,' this means that we've reached our limit. You will not be able to submit your grant application until an application slot becomes available.
Application slots open up frequently at Modest Needs, on a daily - sometimes an hourly - basis, and they're allocated to applicants of all types on a first come/first served basis.
If you're having trouble getting an application slot, here's a tip: the best time to get an application slot is either very early in the morning, or very late in the day.
Yes. If we were unable to approve your Non-Profit Organization's registration request and you'd like to know specifically why we were unable to do so, you should contact Ms. Sarah Martin, Modest Needs' Non-Profit Liaison. Ms. Martin's email address is sarah.martin
modestneeds.org, and her telephone number is (212) 463-7042 x17.
Ms. Martin will be happy to explain to you exactly why we could not approve your Non-Profit Organization's registration request as presented and, if possible, correct any information that prevented us from approving your Non-Profit Organization's initial registration request.
Yes. If you believe that your application was not correctly processed, you may contact Ms. Fawn Volkert, Director of Program Services. Ms. Volkert's email address is fawn.volkertmodestneeds.org, and her telephone number is (212) 463-7042 x12.
Certainly. All of Modest Needs' contact information, including our telephone number and physical address, can be found on the Modest Needs Contact page.
Let us hear from you with your question, and we'll do our best to answer it as quickly as possible.
Please note that due to the volume of correspondence that we receive at Modest Needs, we cannot return calls or respond to email messages that ask questions answered on this FAQ or elsewhere on the Modest Needs website.
