Lippman Family Foundation

Lippman Family Foundation is a small, entirely family-run private foundation — every one of its five directors (Linda, James M., Alexandra, Matthew, and Daniel Lippman) reports zero compensation, and there is no professional program staff, public grants portal, or stated application process (the foundation's own IRS filing lists application instructions as "none"). Independent grant-tracking services (Zeffy, Grantable) following EIN 27-4204823 confirm the foundation "only makes contributions to preselected charitable organizations and does not accept unsolicited requests for funds." This makes it, functionally, a closed relationship-based funder rather than a competitive grant program.

The 70-grant, $5.32M dataset behind this foundation shows a clear pattern: giving flows almost entirely to institutions with a personal or trustee tie to the Lippman family, not to a defined cause area. Cedars-Sinai Medical Center alone has received $3.45M across four grants — by far the largest single relationship — alongside its affiliated Women's Guild ($155,100). Two small East Coast liberal arts colleges, Union College ($483,900) and Skidmore College ($326,000), each received four separate gifts, a pattern consistent with a family member's alma mater rather than a programmatic education initiative. Los Angeles Jewish institutions — Wilshire Blvd Temple ($336,000), University Synagogue ($85,167), and the Jewish Federation ($48,000) — round out the core portfolio, reflecting the family's likely home congregation and community ties near the foundation's Wilshire Blvd office.

For a first-time applicant with no existing connection to the family, JRK Asset Management (the c/o entity on the foundation's IRS filing, a Los Angeles real estate investment firm), Cedars-Sinai, Wilshire Blvd Temple, or Union/Skidmore alumni networks, the realistic path forward is not a cold LOI — there is nowhere to send one — but relationship cultivation: board service, gala or event sponsorship visibility, or an introduction through a mutual contact at one of the institutions above. Smaller, recurring gifts in the $1,000-$10,000 tier (Teach For America, Camp Avoda, Toys for Tots) suggest the foundation is also open to modest annual stewardship gifts once a relationship exists, even without a formal program focus.

The foundation's grant data (70 tracked grants, $5,320,946 total, $76,014 average) sits alongside a more granular typical-grant-size figure drawn from its most recent Form 990-PF Part XV disbursement list: 19 individual grants ranging from $1,000 to $1.9M, with a median of just $11,030 and an average of $149,675 — the wide gap between median and average confirms a barbell pattern of many small gifts and a few outsized relationship grants.

By recipient, giving is concentrated: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center ($3,453,000 across 4 grants) and its Women's Guild affiliate ($155,100 across 4 grants) together account for roughly 68% of the top-50 tracked grantee total. Higher education follows at $869,900 (16%) — Union College $483,900, Skidmore College $326,000, UCLA Foundation $60,000 — and Jewish community/religious organizations at roughly $510,000 (10%) — Wilshire Blvd Temple $336,000, University Synagogue $85,167, Jewish Federation $48,000, Bureau of Jewish Education $25,300, plus several sub-$3,000 federation-chapter gifts. Arts and culture (Sundance Institute $115,650, Skirball Cultural Center $999) make up most of the remainder.

Geographically, California dominates with 40 of 70 tracked grants, followed by New York (16), Utah and Massachusetts (4 each), Texas and Tennessee (2 each), and New Jersey/Virginia (1 each) — CA and NY together represent 80% of grant volume, consistent with the family's Los Angeles base and East Coast college ties.

Total giving has swung sharply with the foundation's investment portfolio rather than following a stable payout formula: from $190,088 in 2015 up to $3,697,242 in 2023, dropping after a rough 2022 (net revenue of -$428,080, giving cut to $809,855, only $448,232 in grants actually paid). Assets peaked at $13.86M in 2021 (helped by $5.49M in net investment income) and have since declined to $9.37M as of FY2024, with FY2024 giving estimated at roughly $2.24M across about 40 grantees per ProPublica's summary of the November 2025 filing — a partial rebound from the 2022 trough but still below the 2021/2023 peak years.

Among the similarly-named "Lippman/Lipman" foundations, this Los Angeles entity is notably more concentrated on a single institution (Cedars-Sinai) than either its New York or Ohio namesakes, which spread giving across dozens of grantees. Unlike the Lippman Kanfer Family Foundation, which runs a public general grant program, this foundation offers no intake mechanism at all, making it more closed than at least one of its name-alike peers. Against pure asset-band peers (Recanati, Wyeth) — both parked at essentially the same ~$9.37M asset size with generic "Philanthropy & Grantmaking" NTEE codes and no public web presence — Lippman stands out simply for having any traceable, analyzable grant history; most $9-10M family foundations at this scale disclose nothing beyond bare 990 filings.

No foundation-issued press releases, program announcements, or leadership changes surfaced in web searches for 2025-2026 — consistent with an unstaffed, five-person family foundation that does not maintain a communications operation. The most concrete recent data point is procedural: the foundation's FY2024 Form 990-PF was filed November 6, 2025, reporting $9,373,004 in total assets, $1,294,331 in total revenue, and (per ProPublica's summary of that filing) approximately $2,244,018 disbursed to charitable causes — about 87% of total expenses — to an estimated 40 grantees, roughly in line with the $2.2M/40-grantee figure independent aggregators report for 2024.

One notable finding from this research is a naming collision worth flagging to any applicant: the URL on file for this foundation, lippmanfamilyfoundation.org, does not belong to this EIN. It resolves to an unrelated Canadian/Florida-based charity run by Murray L. Lippman and Steve H. Lippman, focused on poverty relief in Montreal and giving in Israel, with a separate charity registration number. Applicants researching this Los Angeles foundation (EIN 27-4204823, c/o JRK Asset Management, 11766 Wilshire Blvd Ste 1500) should not use that site or its contact channels — the verified contact is the phone number on file, (310) 268-8344.

Leadership has been stable across all available filing years: Linda Lippman (President), James M. Lippman (CFO/Secretary), and Alexandra, Matthew, and Daniel Lippman (Directors) appear consistently across filings, with no reported turnover or new appointments.

This is not a competitive grants program, and treating it like one will waste effort. The foundation reports no accepting-applications infrastructure — no LOI form, no portal, no deadline, no program officer — and third-party trackers (Zeffy, Grantable) independently confirm it funds only preselected relationships. The single highest-value move for any organization is determining whether it already sits inside the family's orbit: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and its Women's Guild, Wilshire Blvd Temple, University Synagogue, Union College, Skidmore College, UCLA Foundation, Sundance Institute, or a Jewish Federation chapter (LA or Palm Beach/Springs). These account for the large majority of tracked giving, and a warm introduction through any of them is far more productive than outreach directed at the foundation itself.

Because JRK Asset Management (a Los Angeles real estate investment firm) is listed as the c/o contact on the foundation's IRS filing, organizations with any tie to that firm's leadership, tenants, or philanthropic partners — galas it sponsors, boards its executives sit on — have an unusually direct channel worth exploring.

Size the ask realistically: the median individual grant is $11,030, and the bulk of gifts outside the Cedars-Sinai relationship fall in the $1,000-$50,000 range. Requesting a seven-figure gift without an existing multi-year relationship like Cedars-Sinai's is unrealistic; a modest, specific annual ask is far more consistent with observed behavior.

Common mistake to avoid: confusing this foundation with its similarly-named peers. At least two other "Lippman/Lipman" family foundations are active nationally — one in Akron, OH (Lippman Kanfer Family Foundation, which runs a public general grant program worth checking separately) and one in New York (Lipman Family Foundation Inc). Sending a proposal to the wrong entity, or to the Montreal/Boca Raton foundation whose domain confusingly shares this foundation's name, guarantees no response.

Timing: the foundation's fiscal year ends December 31, and its Form 990-PF is typically filed roughly 10-11 months later (FY2024 filed November 2025). Relationship-building conversations in Q3/Q4 align with when year-end giving decisions are likely being finalized.