Are you going to be in charge of planning a funeral for a loved one sometime soon? This is, unfortunately, something that almost everyone will have to do at some point in their lives.
Almost 3 million people die in this country every year. It’s only going to be a matter of time before someone that you love will die, and you’ll have to handle funeral planning for them to some degree.
There are going to be some important factors that you’ll want to consider when making funeral arrangements for your loved one. You should keep them in mind when you’re trying to figure out how to plan a funeral from start to finish.
Here are six of the factors that you’ll need to think about when planning a funeral.
1. Which Funeral Home Are You Going to Use?
There are just under 20,000 funeral homes scattered throughout the country at this time. This means that you shouldn’t have any issues at all tracking one down.
But in a perfect world, you want to work with the best funeral home around while planning a funeral. As a result, you’re going to need to conduct a thorough search when you’re in the market for a funeral home.
To ensure you end up with the right funeral home on your side, you should:
- See which funeral homes operate in your area
- Visit the websites for these funeral homes to see what they’re all about
- Read reviews for these funeral homes
- Conduct interviews with these funeral homes
- See which funeral homes are the most affordable
By taking these steps, you should be able to locate one of the best funeral homes in the business. It’ll make planning a funeral so much less stressful than it would be otherwise.
2. Are You Going to Bury or Cremate Your Loved One?
While you’re in the process of trying to find a funeral home for your loved one’s funeral, you should also start thinking about whether you’re going to bury or cremate them. This could help dictate which funeral home you hire to help you since some funeral homes only specialize in burials or cremations.
You should consider what your loved one would have wanted when having the burial vs. cremation debate in your head. You should also consider your loved one’s religious beliefs as well as where your other family members stand on burials and cremations. It should help you choose one over the other.
3. What Kind of Funeral Service Are You Going to Stage for Your Loved One?
Once you have a funeral home all picked out and know whether you’re going to bury or cremate your loved one, the next order of business will be to decide what kind of funeral service you want to stage for your loved one. Do you want to have:
- A traditional funeral?
- A memorial service?
- A celebration of life ceremony?
Also, do you want the funeral service to be private or open to the public? These are all things that you’re going to have to think about while going through the funeral planning process.
4. Which Casket/Urn Are You Going to Buy for Your Loved One’s Funeral?
If you’re going to bury your loved one, you’re going to need to place their body into a casket before you do. And shopping for a casket can be challenging since there are so many of them available out there in the world.
You should lean on your funeral home for help as you shop for the right casket for your loved one. You should also do the same thing if you’re going to be buying an urn to house a loved one’s remains following a cremation.
You might not need an urn if you’re going to choose to scatter a loved one’s remains. But otherwise, you will need to choose which urn you want to invest in to keep your loved ones remains safe.
5. Where Are You Going to Bury Your Loved One, or What Are You Going to Do With Their Remains?
When planning a funeral for someone who is going to be buried, you shouldn’t forget about obtaining a burial plot for them! Your funeral home should be able to point you in the right direction if you aren’t sure which cemetery you should choose.
You’ll need to purchase a burial plot so that your loved one’s casket can be buried in it. You’ll also want to consider purchasing some kind of marker or headstone to put over the top of their burial plot once they’ve been buried.
Additionally, you’ll want to consider what you’re going to do with a loved one’s remains if you’re going to have them cremated. You can:
- Bring the remains home with you for safekeeping
- Bury the remains in a cemetery or place them into a columbarium
- Scatter them someplace special
The choice will be yours. But you should try to make a decision as far as what you’re going to do with a loved one’s remains long before you have to do something with them.
6. How Much Are You Going to Spend on Your Loved One’s Funeral?
The cost of funeral home services can be on the higher side in some cases. It’s why you want to work with a funeral home that’s not going to charge you an arm and a leg.
It’s also why you want to come up with a budget prior to planning a funeral. You and your family should create this budget and let a funeral director know about it so that they can work to keep you way under it.
Answer These Questions Prior to Planning a Funeral for a Loved One
As you’ve seen here, there is so much to consider when planning a funeral, and this is why end of life planning is so important! Make sure you consider all the necessary factors while you’re making your way through the funeral planning process, helping remove this burden from your loved ones in the future.Â
By going through the funeral checklist that we’ve provided here and answering our questions, you can eliminate a lot of the stress that usually comes with planning a funeral. You’ll be able to focus more on celebrating your loved one’s life and less on planning out everything that’s going to happen while you do it.
Read more about planning a funeral for a loved one by checking out the other articles on our blog.
