Posted: 2/24/2012 5:04:22 PM EDT
do any other brothers have endowments.I bought mine oct 2011 at 54 i was unsure if it would be worth it. if i retire and move i can not take it with me.wife and I are talking of moving to the uk.so i get a plural member ship or just be a guest in the lodge which means.no voting rights and I can not hold office.not a big deal but I feel I would owe somthing to my new lodge.but I feel the endowment would help my lodge long after im gone.its somthing that means a lot to me.what are the brothers thoughts. 
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| endowment is $800 in ohio.my next goal is to buy one in the scottish rite that will be $1200 but my old van is about to die.so thats one more thing to spend money on.I suppose. I see it more as investing in the future of the fraternity.im not hurting for the money but Im careful how i spend |
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Paying yearly is better for the lodge, longterm. At current interest rates, your endowment money will not be worth anything in 10 years and there you sit in your chair for free, so unless you contribute more money, you are costing the lodge. ETA, I dont fault anyone for doing this, it's the current interest rates that are killing the lodges. I believe in PA they are doing away with this program. |
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No endowment or life membership for Blue Lodge here. By-Laws for both of my lodges say life membership may be granted to a member who has continuously paid dues for 25 years.
As our WM looked at who was eligible for it this year, 30% of the members do. It's just not feasible for us to survive if we granted it to all of them. I think Scottish Rite is current dues times 15. |
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Quoted:
No endowment or life membership for Blue Lodge here. By-Laws for both of my lodges say life membership may be granted to a member who has continuously paid dues for 25 years. As our WM looked at who was eligible for it this year, 30% of the members do. It's just not feasible for us to survive if we granted it to all of them. I think Scottish Rite is current dues times 15. we are looking at stopping life memebrships. over a third of our lodge has one and pays no dues. it's killing us slowly. our dues are only 30.00 per year. my intention is to get my perpetual and keep paying dues. 30 years from now if i am old and broke i will still have my dues paid. also the perpetual covers lodge dues not the grand lodge fees.<about 10.00> so if you don't cover that the lodge loses 10.00 every year on your membership. |
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Wow, dues in my lodges are $85 and $150. I proposed an amendment to our by-laws two years ago that changed the setup in the second lodge to be $125 plus current Grand Lodge per capita. Over the years per capita kept going up but our dues didn't so our revenue just kept dropping.
Eliminating the life membership clause is a good idea. The WM can always remit someone's dues if they are not able to pay them. |
| That's the good thing about our PMP. My constituant bodies do not pay per capita to Grand for me. I did that up front when I purchased the PMP. I think the factor for my age was 17 went I got mine. So, I paid 17 years of local dues and per capita up front. Plus, they get the amount of my local dues returned to them. Forever. Everyone wins. |
and another store. So income is not a real issue