Helping Your Loved Ones By Pre-Arranging Your Funeral

No one wants their loved ones to be burdened with high funeral expenses after they die; the grief of losing a loved one is burden enough. One way that you can help save your friends and family both heartache and money is by taking care of funeral planning in advance.

Planning The Funeral

One thing to consider when you're thinking about your own pre-arranged funeral is just how detailed you want your plans to be. At first, it might make sense to plan things out completely; after all, this means that your family won't have to worry about any sort of planning after you die. And for some, this is a good option – especially if you think that planning will be very stressful for those left behind. 

But it's also important to remember that organizing a funeral can help people work out their grief. By giving them something to do, it helps keep people busy. For this reason, it may be preferable to give a rough plan of your funeral rather than plan things out completely. Decide what you would like done with your body, for example, and discuss with your family how formal or informal you would like the service to be. This will allow them to also have a part in the planning of the funeral. After all, funerals are really for the benefit of those left behind.

Life Insurance Benefits

One important discussion that you should have with your family is how you want your life insurance to be used. It's tempting for people to spend a life insurance payout on a funeral; in a way, it feels like free money. But life insurance money is really emergency money, there to help support your family when you no longer can. By deciding in advance how much, if any, of the payout should be used for funeral expenses, you can help keep your family from overspending during their grief.

Prepaying Expenses

Prepaying your funeral expenses can take a lot of the financial stress out of your future funeral. By working with a funeral director, you can also ensure that your ideas about your funeral fit with your budget so that there won't be any surprises for your loved ones.

When signing a contract for prepayment of funeral expenses, there are a couple of things you should be sure to look out for. While it hopefully won't be an issue, you should make sure that your contract stipulates what will happen should the funeral home be bought out by a new owner. In addition, make sure that it lays out whether the costs are locked in or whether they will increase over time so that you understand your budgeting completely.