When it comes to giving to their alma maters or favorite charities, some Americans are doing more than writing checks — they’re donating their homes.

New York University, for one, receives a handful of real estate gifts each year. The school can thank its loyal alumni and other benefactors for a Greenwich Village brownstone, a swath of undeveloped land upstate, a share in a single-family home in Queens, and a parking lot on Long Island, among a slew of other recently acquired properties.

The number of prospective real estate donors is on the rise at NYU, the vice president of principal gifts, David Koehler, said. “Certainly, the number of inquiries are going up,” he said. “I think all of the charities are doing a better job of saying,‘If you want to make a gift, think about all of your assets.'”

Most of the real estate given to NYU is sold for the proceeds, although the university occasionally converts donated Manhattan apartments into faculty housing. Another donated property it held onto is La Pietra — a sprawling villa situated on 57 lush acres in Florence, Italy.That property, which the writer Sir Harold Acton left to the university upon his death in 1994, now houses an NYU study abroad center.

Schools and charities once weary of the liability associated with acquiring property are increasingly shepherding these gifts, the president and CEO of the National Committee on Planned Giving, Tanya Howe Johnson, said. “Because so much wealth is being held in the form of real estate, accepting property makes it easier for philanthropies to meet the needs of their donors,” she said.

Amid a five-plus year real estate boom that has only recently begun to plateau, a home is often an individual’s most appreciated asset — subject to hefty capital gains taxes upon its sale. However, if the home is given to a nonprofit organization, the owner avoids capital gains taxes, and generally gets an income tax deduction. Non-profit organizations accepting real estate donations are not required to pay taxes on those properties in most cases.

There are other formulas for transferring real estate to tax-exempt organizations, and some do it in their wills to ease the estate tax burden on their heirs.The federal government taxes estates of more than $2 million at a rate of nearly 50%.New York State levies taxes of up to 16% on estates worth more than $1 million.

Still, others prefer to establish a “retained life estate,” allowing them to live in their homes until they die; or a “charitable remainder trust,” which can create a lifelong income stream for the donor, according to an estate planning attorney, Saul Kobrick, who has offices in Westchester and on Long Island. In addition to other tax benefits, these options can give donors sizeable income tax deductions, Mr. Kobrick said.

Fund-raising executives should weigh prospective real estate gifts carefully, paying attention to red flags such as environmental problems, retail uses, or outstanding mortgages, the National Committee on Planned Giving’s Ms. Howe Johnson said.

Acquiring cooperative apartments, which make up the vast majority of non-rental units in Manhattan, can also be tricky because co-op boards “don’t often consider letting charities own shares,” even for a short period of time until the apartment is sold, Mr. Koehler of NYU said.

While real estate makes up just 2% of all charitable contributions, it accounts for 16% of noncash donations, a 2003 Internal Revenue Services study showed. Development professionals say that while gifts of stocks and bonds have leveled off in recent years, real estate donations are becoming increasingly common.

“We’re definitely seeing more groups getting money that way,” the editor of the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Stacy Palmer, said. “They’re getting more savvy about accepting gifts of real estate, and they’re becoming more comfortable with the idea.”

Capturing the curve, Devereux Foundation, a $300 million national charity that serves people with developmental and psychological disorders, last year established a subsidiary devoted exclusively to soliciting and managing property donations.

While Devereux has been accepting property donations for more than two decades — it receives three or four properties most years — its new Real Estate Asset Legacy Foundation “creates a visible marketing platform to let people across the country know that we’re serious about accepting real estate gifts,” the charity’s vice president of planned giving and real estate, Allen Thomas, said. It also helps shield the charity’s assets from liability related to real estate gifts.

At Princeton University, the number of people who’ve expressed interested in donating real estate “has gone up significantly in the past year,”the school’s director of planned giving, Ronald Brown, said.”There’s so much talk about how the real estate market might be peaking,” he said.”Some people feel the time is right to consider a gift of real estate, so they can get the maximum tax advantage out of it.”

Over the next several months, the university could acquire up to five $1 million-plus properties from donors, according to Mr. Brown. “When we talk to people about ways they can support a place they love, we’ll talk about what assets they own,” he said. “More frequently, it’s cash or stocks. If someone mentions real estate, especially real estate that they’re not using, through our discussion, we urge them to consider that option.”