How to Find Grants to Fund Capital Projects

Are you looking to expand your services or reach for your community? Maybe you want to expand a building, build a new facility, or develop infrastructure for a philanthropic cause. If so, you may be interested in learning how to find capital projects grants. 

In this guide you will learn:

• What capital projects grants are
• Why they are so important for nonprofits
• How to use Instrumentl to find them fast

Let’s dive in!

Capital projects grants are grants used to fund large scale projects for nonprofits. These projects could include things like the construction of a new building, renovations to a facility, or the purchase of new land or equipment. 

These capital improvements typically allow a nonprofit to expand their impact and reach in some way. 

For example, say your nonprofit has been renting space for its after-school program but has decided to purchase a piece of land to construct its own facility on. A capital project grant could then be used to help cover the cost of the land and the building. The completion of this capital project might allow you to serve more children and offer more services to your community.   

This is why these grants are usually much larger—both in scale and cost—than other types of grants for nonprofits.

Capital projects grants can be extremely important for nonprofits as they can help them increase their impact by increasing their capacity. 

Infrastructure projects are very expensive, so capital projects grants are integral to making them happen. Capital projects grants can be critical for nonprofits looking to expand their services or reach.

Now that you know why capital projects grants are so important, here are a few examples: 

• The U.S. Department of the Treasury has a Capital Projects Fund that awards $10 billion to fund capital projects that respond to public health emergencies. For example, in December 2023 the agency awarded $140 million to the state of Wisconsin for their capital project on digital connectivity throughout the state.

• The Telluride Foundation is another example of funding for capital projects. The foundation funds projects that have already met a minimum of 75% of the capital project budget. 

The Gates Family Foundation regularly invests in capital grants across Colorado to fund nonprofits and community organizations working on:

• Building purchases
• Construction
• Expansion
• Renovation, and
• Land acquisition

When you find a grant opportunity or hear about a funder, you can use Instrumentl to learn more about them. Find out who they fund, what their average grant size is, the locations they send the most awards to and more using Instrumentl’s foundation profiles. Search for your local funders on our foundation lookup page.

As you can see, there are plenty of grants out there, but do you know how to find capital projects grants? Keep reading!

Many funders announce their grant opportunities on their websites, but searching through all of them is a time-consuming and extensive process. Knowing how to find capital projects grants in particular can be daunting. Luckily, you can use Instrumentl to find grants that align with your nonprofit’s mission quickly.

Instrumentl focuses on matching your nonprofit with grant opportunities that best fit your organization.

To start finding capital projects grants, here’s how you do it.

• Create a free Instrumentl account and get access to Instrumentl’s grant management platform for 14 days. 
• With over 400,000 funders on Instrumentl, we ensure that your nonprofit is matched with the most relevant capital projects opportunities.
• Use Instrumentl’s grant management platform for FREE for 14 days!

This section will guide you through a step-by-step process of finding grants using Instrumentl to discover where to find capital projects grants.

The first step to finding capital projects grants is to set up your nonprofit within Instrumentl. 

Once you’ve signed into the platform, you’ll be prompted to create a new project. All of your “project” information will be used to match you with relevant grants. 

Fill In Details On Your Organization

In the “1. Organization” section, you’ll fill in details about your nonprofit, beginning with your organization’s location and fiscal year. 

You will also want to specify the state your organization is registered in and what specific counties your nonprofit serves. That way, Instrumentl can filter out grants that are not relevant to the area you serve.

Click “Save and Continue” to complete this first section.

Provide An Overview Of Your Project

Now that you’ve filled in information about your nonprofit, you’ll move onto the “2. Overview” section where you’ll provide an overview of your project. 

Think of a project in Instrumentl as similar to a “saved search.” You will need to give a name to your project (we titled ours “Food Bank and Homeless Shelter”) but it can be anything related to your search for grant opportunities.

Next, you will select “Matches & Tracking'' for your project type because it will provide you with both grant tracking and funding opportunity matches. You will want to select this type of project if you are seeking grant recommendations.  

You should only choose “Tracking” if you aren’t looking for new funding opportunities and you simply want to track grants you’ve already found.

Once done, click “Save and Continue.”

Specify the Types of Grants You’re Looking for

In the last section, “3. Matches Setup,” you will specify the types of grants you’re looking for. 

First you will specify the type of organization you are (most commonly, just “Nonprofit” rather than “College/University” or “Zoo”). You will also choose whether you’re a faith-based nonprofit and only want to see grants specifically for that purpose.

We chose “Nonprofit” for our applicant type and “No” for grants that are specifically for faith-based organizations or programs.

Then you will select your geographic location based on which areas your project serves. Our nonprofit has a national scope, but you can choose a specific state and even specific counties, if necessary.

Here’s an example of a nonprofit in Pennsylvania choosing counties surrounding the capital:

Next, you will select the field of work you operate in to ensure you get the best grant matches that align with your mission. 

It’s best practice to select 2-5 fields of work so you have a wide enough scope of relevant grants.

When clicking “+Select fields of work,” search the cause you support and select 2-5 keywords from the drop-down that fit your mission. In our example, we searched food and homeless fields.

Next, set a minimum or maximum size for the grants you would like to be matched with. This will filter out grants that don’t fit your funding needs. 

In our example, we set a minimum of $1,000 and no maximum. Our nonprofit will take all the funding it can get!

Specify That You Want To See Capital Projects

Next, you want to share what you will be using the grant funds for. In this case, you would select “Capital Project”. 

When Instrumentl compiles your matches, you won’t have to sift through hundreds of grant opportunities that don’t meet your needs. Instead, you will only see funding matches that are specifically for capital projects. 

After you choose “Capital Projects,” you can also choose what kind of funders you would like to see grants from. If you have no preference, you can choose them all and then filter them out later once Instrumentl gathers your top grant matches.

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Finally, click “Save and Exit.” Instrumentl will then do all the hard prospecting work for you based on the information you’ve shared! 

Invite Your Team Members

Don’t worry about having to research grants for capital projects all on your own. Instrumentl allows you to invite up to 9 team members to collaborate on reviewing your grant matches. 

That way, your entire team can be on the same page when it comes to grant research, funding deadlines, and more!

When you first start reviewing your matches, you’ll notice that Instrumentl resembles an email inbox. The matches are on the left, and when you click on one, the details of the funding opportunity will show on the right.

You should now be ready to start evaluating your matches to find grants that your nonprofit can apply for! 

Briefly Review Your Grant Matches

You will want to start by reviewing your “Funding Opportunity Matches”. These are individual and active grants that align with your search criteria. 

As you can see in the screenshot below, we matched with over 300 active funding opportunities. 

Briefly Review Your Funder Matches

Next, you will want to review your “Funder Matches”. These aren’t active grants, but are instead funders whose missions and funding priorities align with those of your organization.  

These could be funders without websites, or even funders who are invite-only. Just because a funder doesn’t have an active grant posted doesn't mean they don’t want to partner with you and support your organization with funding! 

For more details on how to get noticed by invite-only funders, check out our in-depth guide.

Filter Your Results 

Don’t be overwhelmed if you’re matched with hundreds of opportunities. You can use Instrumentl’s filters to narrow down your search to the most relevant opportunities based on: 

• Funding use
• Field of Work
• Location of Project
• Location of Residency
• Past Giving
• Funder type
• Location
• Saved or hidden on other projects

For example, if you didn’t filter your original search to “Capital Project,” you can do so within your Matches. 

And once you’ve filtered your results, you can also sort them by deadline, amount, best match, and more!

Now that you have filtered and sorted your results, you can start prioritizing your funding opportunities by digging deeper into each potential grant. 

As we mentioned before, you can simply click on one of your matches and the grant’s details will pop up on the right. 

These details contain essential information that will help you evaluate whether a grant is worth pursuing. 

Review the Grant Guidelines

One of the first things you will want to do is review the “FUNDER OPPORTUNITY” tab. This tab will provide you with an overview of the grant, including its focus area, amount, support type, eligibility requirements, guidelines, and more. 

Gather Insights On Funders From Their 990s

Once you’ve reviewed the grant’s guidelines, you can select the “FUNDER 990 REPORT” tab to view a summary of data from the organization’s 990 filings with the IRS. 

Instrumentl distills information pulled from 990s into easy-to-read snapshots so that you can gather invaluable insights into a funder’s:

• Average grant size 
• The number of grants awarded 
• Geographic focus 
• Openness to new grantees 
• Nonprofits previously funded 
• Giving by NTEE codes 

For example, you can see below that this funder has been awarding larger grants to repeat grantees year over year. If you’re a new grantee, this would be key information to consider. 

Once you’ve reviewed the grant guidelines and gathered insights from the funder’s 990s, you can go ahead and click “Save” on the grants that catch your attention. That way, you’ll have a saved list of all the grants you may want to apply for in one place and don’t have to search for them later.

Leave Notes On Your Saved Grants

When you save a grant opportunity, you can also leave notes on it for your whole team to access. 

For example, maybe you’ve worked with a particular funder in the past and want to make note of that so that you can mention your previous partnership in your proposal. 

Assign a Status To Stay Updated On It

Instrumentl also allows you to assign a status to each of your saved grants. At this stage, you would assign this grant as “Researching”. 

This allows your team to manage your grants easily and effectively. 

You can continue saving your grants to Instrumentl’s Tracker for future reference. The Tracker serves as an effective way to manage all of your funding opportunities in one place for easy access and organization.

Update Your Grant Details

Once you decide to apply for a specific grant, you can update its details within your Tracker. To update a grant’s status, simply click on the grant within your Tracker.

You’ll find the “Status” dropdown where you can select the appropriate status for your grant. You can choose from various status options, including “Planned,” “Application in Progress” and “Submitted.”

This feature gives you and your entire team a birds-eye view of all your funding opportunities so that you can efficiently manage your application processes.

Set Fundraising Goals

You can also set fundraising goals within your Tracker to align your grants with your financial targets. In our example, we set a fundraising goal of $350,000 over the next three years.

Never Miss a Deadline

Instrumentl also allows you to organize your saved grants by deadline. That way, you can focus on the most pressing applications first. 

Instrumentl will also send you weekly emails with all your upcoming deadlines and any funder deadline changes.

Assign Tasks To Your Team

Once you’ve decided to begin working on a grant, you can assign tasks within Instrumentl to keep you and your entire team on track. 

You can create a task, choose a deadline, and then assign it to someone within each of your saved grants. 

From your Tracker, you can then click on any grant you’ve saved to see the tasks for that specific opportunity. 

Report On Your Progress

Finally, Instrumentl also makes it easy to generate reports for internal and external stakeholders. 

You can develop reports for your grant opportunities, the awards that you have won, any tasks, and the contact information of funders. These reports are great for keeping your Executive Director or Board of Directors in the loop. 

To wrap up, we are going to answer some frequently asked questions about capital projects grants. 

What is the typical application process for capital projects grants?

The application process for capital projects grants is very similar to a typical grant application. You will develop a proposal, and then the funder will decide if your project is worth funding. Sometimes the process can be more difficult for capital project grants than other types of grants because the awards can be quite large. 

Are capital projects grants typically recurring or one-time funding?

Because capital projects grants fund a specific project, they are usually one-time funding. That being said, the funds are usually much larger than other grants and could be spread over a long period of time.

Are there specific reporting requirements for capital projects grants?

The one drawback of capital projects grants is the extensive reporting requirements. These grants usually require stringent compliance and reporting requirements to prove how you are using the money effectively for the capital project.

Can small nonprofits apply for capital projects grants?

Capital projects are usually on a much larger scale than other types of grants. Although small nonprofits can apply for them, you would need to review the grant requirements to see if your smaller nonprofit can handle the planning, resources, and implementation involved with the project.

What are the common mistakes to avoid when applying to capital projects grants?

Since capital projects grants are large and intensive, not reviewing the application guidelines could significantly derail the chances of you winning the grant. Make sure your nonprofit has the manpower and time to complete the capital projects grant before delving into the laborious application process.

Searching for capital projects grants can be seamless using Instrumentl. Not only can you find grants in your geographic area, but you can filter your matches so that you don’t waste time sifting through grants that do not support your specific program or project.

If you have never used Instrumentl, you can create a 14-day free account and see if it is right for you!