Benefits
Pre-arranging your own funeral is truly a gift of love to your family. It relieves your family of a tremendous burden at a time when they need help more than any other time in their lives. The emotions families go through in the time of death and grief seldom allow for rational thinking. If you have already made these decisions for them, you have given a sense of comfort and peace of mind. Knowing that you took the time to express your wishes helps them through their time of grief without adding the extra burden of these decisions. Funerals can be pre-arranged with as little information as you want, all the way down to the smallest details, such as choosing the Casket, Outside Container and Type of Services you want. Any steps toward pre-arranging will benefit your family.
By funding your pre-arrangement, you can relieve your family of a financial burden as well. Financial decisions should be made calmly and with undisturbed thought. Often this kind of decision is not allowed in a grief situation. Your family should be allowed to concentrate on family, friends and fond memories to help them in their grief, rather than the financial matters of your funeral. At Yanda & Son Funeral Home, we offer families a pre-arrangement discount for funding their wishes. There are several ways of paying for pre-arrangements which are not available at the time of death. These are discussed below.
Types Of Pre-Arrangement
Information - This is the gathering of vital statistical information about yourself and your wishes for your family to follow at the time of death. You should make this information known to your family or to the Funeral Home. We place this information in a personal pre-arrangement file for you. You should never place anything that your family will need immediately in a safety deposit box at the bank.
Non-Specified Pre-Arrangement - This is where you set aside funds for your funeral without selecting merchandise or services. This money is then readily available for your family at the time when they need it. The Funeral Home has no access to this money at any time whatsoever: monies are placed in an insurance product in which the death benefit grows over time so your family can be protected at all times.
Guaranteed Funeral Pre-Arrangement - this is the most common and the most helpful to your family - This type of pre-arrangement is where you truly relieve the burden from your loved ones. You select what type of service you would wish for yourself, the type of casket and the type of outside container, if one is required, and you fund your selections. This is truly the wisest of all the pre-arrangement options because it relieves your family of difficult decisions, you receive a discount for your funding your selections, and it also freezes the cost of your selections, protecting your family from inflation. It guarantees the prices of your selections and saves your family from having to make difficult decisions at a time of grief.
Funding the Guaranteed Funeral Pre-Arrangement
The Insurance Method - With this method you actually take out a Life Insurance Policy on your life for the amount of the funeral you have selected. You make premium payments to the insurance company and you are issued a Life Policy. You can determine how long you want to make premium payments. You can choose to make a single premium which will pay the funeral and the insurance policy in full. If you are in the situation where you can, and want to, pay for the entire funeral in one payment, doing so would be the wisest option, because not only does the funeral home offer discounts for pre-arrangements, but the insurance company also offers a discount for paying in full. If you should choose to make premium payments and should die before you have finished paying for the term you selected, in certain situations the policy pays the remaining balance. You still have the guaranteed funeral contract with the funeral home that guarantees the funeral prices. The funeral home is made the assignee of the policy. This is how the funeral home can guarantee the prices of pre-arrangement. Another benefit to the insurance method is there is no tax liability for interest earned as there is in the older Trust Method.