Hammoud Foundation

The Hammoud Foundation is a small, unstaffed family foundation based in Dearborn, Michigan, funded entirely by the Hammoud family (via Hammoud Family LLC) and run by three unpaid officers — Yasser T. Hammoud (President), Susan Hammoud (Vice President), and Taysir Hammoud (Treasurer). With $7.2M in assets but only $288,554 given across 59 tracked grants (average $4,891 per grant), this is not built for large, competitive open proposals — it is a vehicle for a Lebanese-American family in the Dearborn community to fund a memorial scholarship (named for the late Hajj Taysir and Hajji Nahla Hammoud) plus a steady stream of smaller education, community, and religious/civic donations. First-time applicants should understand the relationship progression here is informal, not tiered: there is no LOI stage, no program officer, and no site-visit process. The entire application consists of a downloadable Word-document form ("Hammoud Scholarship Foundation Application") linked from the site's Get Involved page, submitted directly by mail or phone contact to the Dearborn office. The foundation strongly favors organizations and individuals with a pre-existing tie to the family or to the Dearborn/Detroit Lebanese-American and Muslim community — grantee data shows repeat, multi-year giving to the same University of Michigan campuses, Wayne State, Henry Ford College, and Michigan State recipients, plus named individual scholarship recipients (Seena Ankouni received $110,000 across 5 grants, the single largest line item in the dataset at 38% of tracked giving) and Dearborn-area civic/religious organizations like Bint Jbeil Organization and Eternal Light Organization. Nationally unaffiliated nonprofits with no Michigan or community connection are unlikely to break through without an introduction. First-time applicants should lead with a Michigan or Dearborn-area connection, a direct educational purpose (tuition, scholarship, or student support), and — where possible — a warm introduction through someone already known to the family rather than a cold, generic proposal.

Giving is small-dollar and concentrated. Of the 59 tracked grants totaling $288,554, 44 (75%) went to Michigan recipients, with Tennessee (4), Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, and Ohio (2 each) rounding out the rest. The single largest line item is $110,000 across 5 grants to a named individual, Seena Ankouni — 38% of all tracked giving — reflecting the foundation's pattern of direct, personally-directed support alongside institutional gifts. Education-purpose grants make up roughly 40% of dollars, anchored by the University of Michigan system ($63,942 combined across the Regents of the University of Michigan and University of Michigan directly), Wayne State University ($24,470 across 5 grants), and Henry Ford College ($17,604 across 5 grants); smaller recurring education gifts go to Michigan State, Eastern Michigan, Schoolcraft College, and Lansing Community College. Donation-purpose gifts to community and religious organizations make up most of the remainder, led by Eternal Light Organization ($20,000) and Bint Jbeil Organization ($14,000), both single-grant gifts likely tied to Dearborn's Lebanese-American community. The most recent 10-grant cohort (per foundation-reported typical grant size) ran from $1,000 to $17,322, with a median of $1,750 and an average of $5,032 — smaller than the multi-year average, suggesting individual grant sizes have compressed even as named recipients like Madonna University ($12,500, FY2025) show the foundation can still write a mid-five-figure check when a cause resonates. Total giving has been volatile rather than formulaic: $23,756 in FY2023, $92,119 in FY2022, $133,918 in FY2021, $69,776 in FY2020, and $134,970 in FY2019. This tracks the family's annual cash contributions to the foundation ($195K–$300K most years since 2019) more closely than a fixed payout percentage of the $7.2M asset base — in low-contribution years like 2023, giving drops sharply. Applicants should expect total annual capacity in the $25K–$135K range, spread across 10–15 grants per year, not a single large award.

The Hammoud Foundation sits in a tight cluster of five near-identical-asset peer foundations (all ~$7.22M in assets, all classified Philanthropy & Grantmaking), suggesting it was grouped by asset size rather than mission overlap. None of these peers, including Hammoud, publish formal RFPs or run competitive cycles — all are small, closely-held family vehicles.

Hammoud stands out among this peer set as the only foundation with a public-facing website and a documented, if informal, application path — most of these asset-matched peers (Rosecan, Tucker, Darion, Masser) have no public site at all, implying purely relationship-driven, invitation-only giving. That makes Hammoud comparatively more accessible to an unconnected applicant than its typical $7.2M-asset peer, even though its own giving still leans heavily toward known family and community ties.

The most recent available filing (FY2025, per Cause IQ) shows total revenue of $357,153 (up 10% year-over-year) against $51,710 in expenses, with assets ending near $7.22M. The foundation made 10 grants in FY2025, the two largest disclosed being $12,500 to Madonna University and $6,000 to Michigan State University, both education-purpose gifts, alongside smaller community donations such as $800 to the Salvation Army. No press coverage, leadership changes, or new program announcements were found for the foundation itself in 2025-2026 — web searches for "Hammoud Foundation" news are dominated by unrelated coverage of Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud (a different, unaffiliated Hammoud), which should not be confused with this family foundation. The foundation's own website confirms its flagship named program is the Hammoud Foundation Scholarship, established in memory of Hajj Taysir and Hajji Nahla Hammoud, with an active "Apply Today" link to a downloadable Word-document application as of this research. Officer leadership (Yasser T. Hammoud, President; Susan Hammoud, Vice President; Taysir Hammoud, Treasurer) has been stable across all filings reviewed, with all three continuing to serve without compensation. Given the lack of press presence and unstaffed structure, grant seekers should not expect a rapid or high-visibility news cycle from this funder — activity here is best tracked through annual 990 filings and direct contact rather than public announcements.

This is a relationship-first, paperwork-light funder — treat it accordingly. First, download the "Hammoud Scholarship Foundation Application" Word document from hammoudfoundation.com/get_involved rather than searching for an online portal; none exists. If the link is broken or the form looks stale, call the foundation directly at (313) 240-9867 rather than assuming it's inactive — with zero staff, the website is unlikely to be actively maintained. Second, lead with a Michigan connection: 75% of tracked grants (44 of 59) went to Michigan recipients, and the largest institutional gifts consistently go to the same handful of in-state universities (University of Michigan, Wayne State, Michigan State, Henry Ford College, Madonna University). An out-of-state applicant with no Dearborn or Michigan tie faces a materially harder path. Third, frame the ask around education or direct community/religious support — those are the only two purposes (EDUCATION and DONATION) that appear anywhere in the foundation's grant history; broader program-based proposals (capacity building, general operating support, multi-year grants) don't match any observed giving pattern here. Fourth, keep the ask modest and specific: the FY2025 typical grant ranged $1,000–$17,322 with a median of just $1,750, so a request framed as a single scholarship, a specific student's tuition gap, or a discrete community need will fit the foundation's actual behavior far better than an open-ended proposal. Fifth, since this is a family-directed foundation with no program officer, the most common mistake to avoid is treating this like an institutional funder — there is no formal review committee process to reference, no published deadline, and no multi-stage LOI-to-proposal pipeline to navigate. A warm introduction through someone already connected to the Hammoud family or the Dearborn Lebanese-American community (mosque, cultural organization, or one of the previously-funded universities) will do more than a polished but cold written proposal. Finally, apply outside of major giving-season crunch if possible — with only 10-15 grants disbursed per year by three unpaid officers, timing an application when the family isn't managing a large annual contribution cycle (fall, around the academic year, based on the education-heavy grant mix) likely improves response time.