I remember the day distinctly: I came home and told my wife I was giving away the medical oxygen business that I had spent the last seven years building. Initially she thought I was crazy.

She wasn't the only one. I received the same reaction from my trusted CPA, who had been my confidant, adviser and mentor for more than 25 years, ever since I moved to Denver from Utah, having left a cushy job as a Deseret News reporter to venture out into the real world of entrepreneurship.

While I admitted to both of them that giving away a business that had gross revenues approaching $5 million per year sounded, on the surface, rather irresponsible, I pleaded with them to hear me out.

You see, I had just attended a free seminar about the value of donating appreciated assets, such as stock, real estate and privately owned businesses, to a legal entity known as a Charitable Remainder Unitrust. And that is actually what I decided to do with my fast-growing business, which had recently been added to the Inc. 500 listing.

At the time I was on a fast track and had expanded our business into eight offices in six states. I had even written to the president of a national company offering to buy his Denver office. "We don't sell companies, we buy them," he responded. "We would like to buy yours."

The national company had done its due diligence on my company. They offered a nice price and informed me that once they were the owners of "my baby" they would have no further need of my services. I would end up with a seven-figure bank account and a seven-figure income tax bill to Uncle Sam. I loved the idea of the big bank account, but hated the idea of writing that check to Uncle Sam.

That's when I remembered the idea of the Charitable Remainder Unitrust (CRUT).

Now, I've got to be honest. When I first heard about the CRUT, alarms went off in my mind. It sounded too good to be true. But it IS true. By organizing one, a person can have a legitimate, ethical method of avoiding a huge tax bill. At the same time, you have an opportunity to help a worthy cause by donating to charity whatever money is left in the trust at the time of your death.

If you are considering reaping a harvest of some magnitude by selling your company or some other valuable asset, you might want to investigate creating your own Charitable Remainder Unitrust, with you as the managing trustee. That's what we did after my wife and my CPA thoroughly investigated the idea and fell in love with my decision to give the company away. As I look back, that single decision to give away the company to a Charitable Remainder Trust was as important as the decision to sell in the first place.

Curt Bassett, a tax attorney who is the principal of Princeton Social Capital, www.princetonsc.com, recently introduced me to several other powerful charitable tools that might help you if you are about to harvest a large piece of real estate, stock or a company. His toolkit of attractive tax-advantaged charitable vehicles is full of ideas such as a NimCrut, CRAT, a Donor Advised Fund (DAF), a supporting organization (SO), a family foundation and several more. Each can be tailored by Curt or your own estate attorney to meet your needs and possibly provide you with continuous income for the rest of your life while allowing you to help the less fortunate after your death. And each gives you a little more control over money that would otherwise flow directly to our dear old Uncle Sam.

I guess the true test of my CRUT decision a decade ago is my answer to a simple question: "Knowing what you know now, would you still give your company away?"

The answer is a resounding "yes." And I would do it the exact same way.