Pre-Planning

When you plan in advance, you are making choices based on your wishes as to how your final arrangements will be carried out. It is a process by which you can eliminate confusion, uncertainty, and unnecessary expense on the part of your family making your burial and funeral arrangements. Fortunately you will have already made all the needed decisions.

Things to Consider

A funeral service usually includes professional services, transportation services, embalming and other preparation, facilities for visitation, the funeral service, and a funeral coach. Funeral merchandise includes a casket and other associated items.

Cemetery decisions include property, vaults, commital service, and memorialization. There are more than 50 decisions that must be made when there is a death in the family.

Advantages of Advanced Planning

There are many advantages when you take care of your final arrangements in advance. The most obvious benefit is financial, but the most important is the emotional benefit. When making burial arrangements at the time of need, you tend to make hasty decisions. When you make arrangements in advance you have a better opportunity to make informed choices. One of the most difficult situations your loved one will ever face is to have to walk into a casket selection room and decide which casket would be best. Another difficult decision is what cemetery and what location within the cemetery would be most preferred.

One of the most serious misconceptions is that “the money will be there for final burial.” While that is often the case, circumstances can either reduce or limit access to funds needed at the time of passing. A major threat to these funds is often high health care costs leading up to death. Another concern is that savings could be tied up in probate or be invested in areas that are not readily accessible.

A major financial benefit when making arrangements in advance of need is that you guarantee today’s prices and your choices can be paid over period of time, instead of immediate payment, which is required at the time of need.

In summary the three main reasons to pre-pay final expenses are:

It gives you peace of mind.
It spares your family potential financial and emotional burdens.
It can lock in today’s prices.

Ways to Proceed

The best way to pre-arrange is to have one of our staff advisors explain your options. Knowing that this subject is not always comfortable, our advisors are trained to “walk you through” the process in a very comfortable, sensitive setting. Our intention is to provide you with all of your options, assess what your specific needs are, and help you put them on paper.