ERP for nonprofits built for grant compliance, not just bookkeeping.
Custom ERP for nonprofits — FASB-compliant donor-restriction accounting, Uniform Guidance indirect cost rates, Form 990 functional expense allocation, and single-audit-ready reporting in one system.
QuickBooks doesn't know what 2 CFR 200 means.
Most nonprofits run on QuickBooks or a packaged fund-accounting tool plus a separate donor CRM, then hit the same wall once they're running more than a couple of grants: net assets have to be tracked as with-donor-restrictions or without (FASB ASU 2016-14), and the system needs to release those restrictions automatically when a grant's conditions are met — not get reclassified by hand in a year-end journal entry.
Any org taking federal or pass-through funding adds a second layer most small-business tools never touch: an indirect cost rate under Uniform Guidance (2 CFR 200) — either a negotiated NICRA or the 10% de minimis rate — applied consistently across cost pools, plus a Schedule of Expenditures of Federal Awards (SEFA) if you cross the $750k threshold that triggers a Single Audit.
Then there's Form 990: functional expense allocation across program services, management & general, and fundraising isn't optional, and auditors expect it backed by real time studies, not a plausible-looking percentage split invented in March. Bolting a grant-tracking spreadsheet onto QuickBooks gets you a fund-accounting label. It doesn't get you automatic restriction release, a defensible indirect cost allocation, or functional expense numbers that survive an audit.
Restricted funds and cost pools built into the schema, not reconciled at year-end.
We build net asset classification, grant-level fund accounting, and indirect cost allocation as core parts of the data model. Revenue and expense post against a specific grant and program from day one; restrictions release automatically when the underlying condition — a time period, a matching requirement, a deliverable — is actually met, not when someone remembers to reclassify it.
Your negotiated indirect cost rate (or the 10% de minimis rate) applies consistently across cost pools as transactions post, so the SEFA and Single Audit workpapers are a report, not a quarter-end project. Functional expense allocation runs off real FTE time data tied to payroll, so program/management/fundraising splits on your Form 990 are defensible instead of estimated.
Honest tradeoff: if you're a small nonprofit running one or two grants with a straightforward budget, a packaged tool like Aplos, QuickBooks Nonprofit, or Sage Intacct out of the box is the right call — don't pay to rebuild something that already works. Custom starts earning its cost once you're managing multiple federal or state grants with different indirect cost rates and reporting formats, passing funds through to subrecipients you have to monitor, or consolidating a fiscal-sponsorship structure across related entities.
We ship the modules you need first, then add the rest. Most clients don't need every module on day one.
Donor-restriction net asset accounting
Net assets classified with-donor-restrictions or without per FASB ASU 2016-14, with automatic release to unrestricted when the grant's time or condition requirement is met.
Grant & fund accounting
Revenue and expense tracked at the grant and program level from the transaction up, across multi-year and multi-funder awards, with real-time budget-to-actual by grant.
Uniform Guidance (2 CFR 200) cost allocation
Negotiated indirect cost rate (NICRA) or the 10% de minimis rate applied consistently across defined cost pools as transactions post — not recalculated by hand at close.
Form 990 functional expense allocation
Program services, management & general, and fundraising splits driven by real FTE time data tied to payroll, not a year-end estimate an auditor has to take on faith.
Single Audit / SEFA readiness
Schedule of Expenditures of Federal Awards generated from the same grant ledger driving day-to-day reporting, ready for a Uniform Guidance Subpart F audit once you cross the $750k federal-spend threshold.
Subrecipient monitoring
Pass-through funding tracked to the subrecipient level, with risk assessment, reporting deadlines, and documentation status visible before a monitor visit, not assembled after one is scheduled.
Board & funder reporting
Board packets and funder-specific report templates generated from live data instead of a rebuild in Excel every quarter.
Donor CRM integration
Two-way sync with your donor CRM (Salesforce NPSP, Bloomerang, Raiser's Edge) — the ERP owns fund accounting and compliance, the CRM owns the relationship, and neither has to fake the other's job.
Multi-entity & fiscal sponsorship reporting
Consolidated and entity-level reporting for organizations with related entities or a fiscal-sponsorship structure, without maintaining parallel books by hand.
How a custom nonprofits ERP gets built.
Same structure every time. We ship the first module to your team in 4–8 weeks, then build the rest while they're already using it.
- 01
Discover
1–2 weeks. We sit with your team, map workflows, and pick the first module to ship.
- 02
Architect
1–2 weeks. Data model, integrations, deployment topology. Documented before any code.
- 03
Build slice 1
3–5 weeks. First production module — usually the highest-pain part of your current workflow.
- 04
Build slices 2–N
1–3 months. Additional modules deployed continuously. Each integrates with the existing data model.
- 05
Run
Ongoing. We stay on after launch — bug fixes, new features, integrations as your business changes.
Built to integrate with the systems you already use.
The integrations below come up most often for nonprofits operators. Anything with an API is fair game — these are just the common ones.
- Salesforce Nonprofit Success Pack (NPSP)
- Bloomerang / Raiser's Edge NXT
- QuickBooks Online / Sage Intacct (migration path, not a replacement for the compliance layer)
- Bill.com (AP automation)
- ADP / Gusto (payroll — feeds FTE time allocation)
- Grant management platforms (Fluxx, GrantHub, AmpliFund)
- ACH / banking providers
- Expense & time-tracking (for functional expense allocation)
- Identity/access providers (board portal access control)
- BI / reporting (Metabase, Looker)
Custom ERP for other industries.
Modern, boring, hireable.
We build on standard tools your future team will be able to hire for. No proprietary platforms.
- Next.js
- TypeScript
- React
- Tailwind
- Postgres
- Prisma
- Drizzle
- Redis
- Vercel
- Railway
- Fly.io
- Docker
- Clerk
- WorkOS
- Auth0
- Stripe
- Plaid
- QuickBooks API
- Postgres views
- Metabase
- Recharts
The proof we ship ERPs.
Clear answers
for complex builds.
Clear answers on timelines, pricing, ownership, and what shipping actually looks like with a senior engineering team.
If a packaged system already handles your grant count, indirect cost rate, and reporting formats within budget, buying is the right call — we'll say so on a discovery call if it's true. Custom starts winning once you're running multiple grants with different indirect cost rates and funder-specific reporting formats, or monitoring subrecipients, none of which a generic package flexes to fit.
Yes, if it's built that way from the start. Your negotiated indirect cost rate or the 10% de minimis rate applies consistently across cost pools as transactions post, and the SEFA generates from the same grant ledger driving daily reporting — the workpapers an auditor asks for come out of the system instead of getting assembled by hand every year.
Yes — and you should keep it. The ERP owns fund accounting, grant compliance, and functional expense allocation; the CRM owns donor relationships and campaigns. We sync the two so a gift posts correctly in both without double entry, but we don't try to make one system do the other's job.
Program services, management & general, and fundraising splits are driven by real FTE time data tied to payroll, updated as staff time shifts across programs — not a percentage estimated once a year. That gives your auditor a defensible number backed by data instead of a plausible guess.
A general ERP tracks revenue and cost. Nonprofit work adds FASB donor-restriction accounting with automatic release, Uniform Guidance indirect cost rate allocation, Form 990 functional expense splits, and Single Audit/SEFA readiness — a compliance layer a standard business ERP has no reason to carry.
Usually $70k–$260k and 3–6 months for grant-level fund accounting, donor-restriction net asset tracking, indirect cost allocation, and your core integrations (donor CRM, payroll, banking). Subrecipient monitoring and multi-entity consolidation are common phase-two additions once the core grant ledger is live.
Tell us your current systems, what's breaking, and what you'd want a fitted ERP to do — we'll come back with a written scope and a fixed quote.