DavidIf you’ve been a bargain lover your entire life, there’s no reason you shouldn’t also look for ways to save money when it comes to your final expenses. And the best way to cut costs is to pay for your funeral in advance. Why?
There are three principal financial advantages to paying in advance. One, you lock in the price. Two, you can design your services to suit your preferences. And three, you won’t leave your family in debt.
1. Your Price Doesn’t Change
It’s always difficult to imagine how things will be in the distant future. However, history shows us that we can usually count on prices to rise.
That’s also true with the funeral industry. As the cost of materials and labor increases, funeral prices must follow suit. That means that no matter how much a funeral costs today, it’s likely to cost far more a decade or more from now.
Many people have recognized the inevitability of rising costs and acted accordingly. They locked in the cost of their final expenses by paying for their funeral in advance.
They have the assurance that their families won’t have the burden of paying for a funeral no matter how out of control the economy. The guarantee of a locked-in price has no time expiration. The price is valid for five years from now or 50 years in the future.
2. You Can Select the Details of Your Service
The only way to make sure your funeral arrangements are according to your wishes is to handle the planning personally. You can allow yourself to be as detailed as you wish. You can decide which funeral home you prefer and how it will care for your remains. Do you want to be buried? Do you prefer a standard in-ground burial plot or a mausoleum? Or do you want to be cremated?
There are other options, too. Some people gift their remains to schools of science. Others choose so-called natural or green burials where legal. Will there be a wake? Will there be a viewing?
You can select the services that you want in connection with the funeral. For example, you can choose whether there will be a funeral service, a graveside ceremony, a memorial, a combination, or neither. You could also decide whether the family will use the funeral home’s limousine escort or arrive in personal vehicles.
3. You Save Your Family From Debt
Grief makes people vulnerable. When someone in the family dies, there’s pressure on the survivors to demonstrate their love by overspending on funeral costs.
For example, they can feel compelled to purchase the most elaborate casket available. They may also believe that the burial plot should be in a highly-coveted location. And the headstone should be prominent with elaborate carving.
An extravagant funeral can easily place a family in debt. Often, it’s debt that the family can’t afford. In turn, that debt may influence other family financial decisions for years. For example, the debt could keep them from purchasing a needed vehicle or repairing the home.
But paying for your funeral in advance is a way to keep your family from experiencing financial hardship. After all, you want to leave them with good memories. You don’t want them to associate you with a persistent financial burden.