Is it smart to Preplan your own Funerals?

None of us likes talking about funerals or death. Especially if we talk about family members or even plan own funerals. But at some point, all of us have to start thinking about the funeral. You can make things much easier on your family and get the send-off you want by planning your own. While some have no problem planning their own funeral, it’s understandable if you or some of your family find it too difficult or overwhelming. However, you can still let your family know a few major aspects to make it much smoother for everyone involved.

Going by reports, more than 69 percent of Americans beyond 40 years of age prefer to preplan their funerals ahead by discussing with family members.

What you need to consider

First: Let your family and loved ones know, what should they do with your remains. There are several options for your remains after death, including a standard burial, cremation, entombment, or donating your body to scientific research.

Once you establish what you would like done with your remains, consider where you prefer to be placed after death.

Traditional burial or cremation are the two most common ways to handle your body after death, but there are other options, including entombment or donating your body to scientific research. The option you choose is a personal preference, but may also rely upon your budget, family, or spiritual beliefs.

Do you want to have a memorial service, and what kind of memorial service do I want?

When planning your memorial service, consider your friends and family. While this is a celebration of your life, it’s also intended to comfort your loved ones so they can begin grieving. If there are any special traditions, music, or prayers that are dear to you and your family, consider including these in your memorial service.

Typically, the memorial service is held in a funeral home of your choice, community hall, or church to honor the deceased and celebrate their life. You can arrange it based on your personal preferences, budget, family traditions or religion.

Memorial service may include one or all of the following:

A wake: family and friends gather to pay tribute to you and share memories in a family member’s home or a hall.
Viewing: family and friends come together to view your body.
Cremation or burial ceremony: a formal or informal ceremony is held in a place of your choosing. This type of service may include prayers, a slideshow, eulogies, music, or a sermon.

Choose a Funeral Director

Most of the people use the services of a funeral home and work with their funeral director to plan your burial or cremation and funeral or memorial service. The funeral director can also advise you about purchase any funeral merchandise and services you’ll need for the burial, cremation, funeral, or memorial service. Here you need to be very careful and don't rush yourself into buying any goods, shop around, compare the prices. The prices for all funeral merchandise and especially funeral caskets are widely varied. Typically, the funeral costing between $8,000 and $15,000, you need to treat this like any other large purchase. You wouldn’t buy a car from the first dealership you walked into. So don’t buy a funeral without checking with more than one funeral home. You can pay thousands less just by going a few miles down the road. Call several funeral homes and get quotes. Some funeral homes are reluctant to reveal prices, but if they resist, insist. The Federal Trade Commission requires them to quote prices over the phone or in person.

All the funeral homes sell services as a package of goods and services, but often there’s more wrapped into them than you want. Sometimes they don’t have all the goods and services you want. For example, a gravestone and cemetery plot may not be included in a package. Ask for an itemized list upfront, with prices for each service or item. Buy only the service and products that you want, you don’t have to buy a package. You can buy funeral products and services individually and combine them into the funeral you want.

For instance, If we talking about the funeral casket or coffins, most of the funeral homes usually charging twice or even three times more then third party retailers like us. The average cost of the funeral casket from a funeral home is $3,500-5000. Our company Trusted Caskets will deliver an $840 casket with free shipping for most areas in the US.

Going back to all of the above, you get a number of benefits if you are planning a funeral in advance, including:

- Ease the burden on your family.

- You can take the financial responsibility for your funeral and ease this burden for your family;

- You family can have the emotional benefits for your relatives;

- You can prepare your final wishes to be followed;

- You can have your affairs in order at the end of your life.