FROM NAOMI STANHAUS, RRF FOUNDATION FOR AGING
APRIL 2026

AFN Short Take is a blog series highlighting insights and perspectives from recent AFN programming events.

Asset funders share a core conviction: that every family deserves the chance to achieve economic stability and pass opportunity forward. Much of our field’s energy goes into expanding access to savings tools, homeownership, small business capital, and education. But building wealth and protecting it are two sides of the same coin.

Across the country, families are navigating rising costs, medical debt, income volatility, and predatory financial practices that can erode years of hard-won progress in a matter of weeks. A single debt collection action can empty a bank account, garnish a paycheck, or force the sale of a home, undoing the very assets funders have invested in helping families build.

Preserving those assets is not a separate agenda from wealth building. It’s an essential part of the equation. Financial preservation strategies can be supported by state-regulated consumer protections.

With the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau facing significant federal rollback, states have become the primary place where consumer protections are advanced, defended, and strengthened. Earlier this year, AFN convened a webinar on state consumer financial protections and the opportunities for philanthropy to engage, bringing together Michael Best of the National Consumer Law Center (NCLC), Ann Baddour of Texas Appleseed, and John Bouman of Legal Action Chicago, with RRF Foundation for Aging providing the funder perspective.

The conversation was energizing. Across the country, advocates are advancing protections that matter. And philanthropy has a meaningful role to play in that effort.

The Stakes: What Weak Debt Protections Actually Cost Families

State exemption laws determine how much of a family’s wages, bank account, home, or car a creditor can seize when collecting on a debt. When those protections are weak or non-existent, the consequences are immediate: a frozen bank account means missed rent. A garnished paycheck means choosing between medicine and a car payment. A forced home sale can wipe out a family’s primary asset overnight.

Older adults face particular risk. Forty percent of people on Medicare carry medical debt, often without access to hospital financial assistance, a burden likely to grow as health insurance subsidies face potential cuts. Many older people stand to lose their homes—their principal asset—through unfair property tax sales and the growing number of predatory financing schemes, such as home equity investments. More than 3.5 million people aged 60 and over carry student loan debt, with one-third in default, putting Social Security benefits at risk of garnishment. For many older households, the goal is not to build new assets but to protect what they already have. Consumer protections are central to that.

National Consumer Law Center’s (NCLC) No Fresh Start report grades all 50 states on protections for five core assets: wages, the family home, the family car, household goods, and bank accounts. No state earned an A. That gap represents both real harm to families and a concrete opportunity for funders to act.

“Many state enforcers, regulators, and legislators want to fill that vacuum left behind by federal legislative action and deregulation…That’s where the opportunity is.

Michael Best, National Consumer Law Center

What makes this moment particularly promising is that consumer financial protection is a genuinely bipartisan issue. Protecting families from drained bank accounts and garnished wages resonates across party lines because it is fundamentally about affordability and fairness. That bipartisan opening creates real room for state-level progress, even in challenging political environments. And because these issues touch high-cost lending, medical debt, housing, utilities, credit reporting, and data privacy, funders can engage through nearly any portfolio focus.

Proof of Concept: What Funded Advocacy Looks Like

The panelists didn’t just describe the problem. They demonstrated what patient, reliable funding for sustained, committed advocacy can achieve.

In Texas, Ann Baddour of Texas Appleseed described successes from the 2025 legislative session: protections for widows facing post-death insurance rate hikes, coerced debt legislation protecting survivors of intimate partner violence, a tightened data broker registry, and new consumer protections against solar panel fraud that disproportionately targeted older adults and Spanish speakers.

Just as important was what her coalition stopped: over five sessions spanning a decade, they blocked subprime lenders from raising interest rates in Texas, a stand she estimates has saved Texans $2 billion over five years.

““These are really bipartisan issues… Every single one of our wins was bipartisan. We couldn’t be successful in the work that we do without coalitions, and our state-based coalitions are both our moral support and our political power.

Ann Baddour, Texas Appleseed

In Illinois, John Bouman of Legal Action Chicago detailed a parallel record. A four-year effort produced Senate Bill 1738, establishing the state’s first automatic bank account protection, eliminating filing fees for defendants, and tripling the homestead exemption (the amount of home equity protected from creditors).

The organization also advanced coerced debt legislation, won low-income utility discounts, and secured a favorable summary judgment in a class action that would protect home equity wealth for roughly 2,500 Cook County residents who lost homes to property tax debt that was a fraction of their equity, with a final ruling pending. They also backed legislation to ensure all people, regardless of immigration status, can safely access the courts to assert their rights in debt proceedings.

Behind both is a shared infrastructure: National Consumer Law Center (NCLC) provides research, model legislation, and real-time technical expertise for state organizations to use without building from scratch. In turn, state-level learnings shape NCLC’s national models. Supporting that ecosystem, not just individual campaigns, makes progress durable and replicable across states.

How Funders Can Engage: Three Entry Points

The panel’s advocates were direct about what philanthropy can do. Here are three concrete entry points drawn from the conversation:

1. Fund for consistent presence, not just a campaign.

State advocates who are present, building relationships, and positioned at the table can block harmful bills that no one anticipated, jump onto promising legislation that stalls, and respond when the political moment shifts. That kind of sustained presence requires flexible, general operating support–the funding that gives advocates the ability to pivot without waiting for a new grant cycle.

2. Invest in the full arc, from passage to practice.

Passing a law is one step. Baddour’s coerced debt work in Texas illustrates what comes next: a pilot to understand how survivors access relief, and now a hoped-for Phase 2 to take those learnings and streamline access at scale. A good law that no one can access does not achieve its goal. Funders can support implementation, legal access, testing to document gaps, and the community outreach that turns policy reforms into lived change.

3. Look for unlikely allies and help convene them.

Some of the most effective advocacy moments happen when unlikely partners find common ground. In one example from the session, a Social Security advocacy win became possible when nonprofit advocates joined forces with a Social Security claimant group that had paid lobbyists, leveraging nearly a million dollars in combined advocacy capacity. Philanthropy is uniquely positioned to identify and convene those kinds of partnerships, and to support the narrative and communications work that helps shift how debt is understood, from personal failure to systemic challenge, a strategy funders like RRF Foundation for Aging have used to reach millions of people on this issue.

Consumer financial protection is a space where many sectors already have a seat at the table: financial institutions, employers, community organizations, and policymakers all shape how these protections function in practice. Philanthropy’s voice adds something distinct: a focus on equity, long-term impact, and the families most at risk of being left behind. Engaging in policy conversations, building relationships with decision-makers, and showing up consistently is simply part of how change gets made at the state level, and philanthropy belongs in that mix.

On lobbying specifically: the vast majority of advocacy work (research, education, coalition building, communications) is fully fundable by private foundations. Lobbying can be conducted by public charities using non-restricted funds, and responsible organizations doing this work understand the rules well. For funders willing to consider supporting advocacy, it can make the difference in moving policy across the finish line.

Where to Start

State consumer financial protections are not a niche policy area. They are the floor that keeps other investments from caving in. Whether your portfolio centers on housing, health, aging, economic mobility, or racial equity, the families you care about are navigating debt. A few questions worth sitting with as you consider where to engage:

  • Where does your state stand? National Consumer Law Center’s (NCLC) No Fresh Start report grades all 50 states on asset exemption protections. Is there advocacy capacity in your region that needs support? NCLC can help you make that connection.
  • Who is already doing this work? State advocacy organizations are often the leanest players at the legislative table, doing the most essential work with the least resources. Long-term, flexible funding helps them stay present when it matters most.
  • Are you funding the full continuum? From research and coalition building to implementation and legal access, the strongest investments follow policy reforms all the way through to ensuring they have the impact on families they are meant to serve.

Advocates across the country are advancing on these issues, doing so with lean teams, strong coalitions, and a long-game mentality. For funders, this is an invitation to join them, not just as supporters of individual bills, but as committed partners to strengthen and sustain these efforts, building the durable infrastructure that protects what families have worked so hard to achieve.

Explore the webinar recording and AFN’s resources on consumer financial protections and asset preservation here.

RRF Foundation for Aging is a national funder dedicated to improving the quality of life of older people, with a particular focus on curbing rising debt and protecting the economic security of older adults. We know debt doesn’t discriminate by age and that the systems we build to protect older adults strengthen everyone.