Planning ahead for a funeral — yours or a loved one’s.
Doing this now, when nothing is urgent, is one of the cheapest and kindest things you can do for the people you love. A few hours of research saves your family thousands and hours of decisions at the worst moment of their lives.
Typical overpayment when a family shops under crisis, without a reference range.
Price variation between funeral homes in the same zip code for the same services.
A conversation this weekend about preferences. It’s the highest-leverage thing you can do.
The Honest Funeral arrangement cheat sheet.
One page. The nine things to ask any funeral home. The five upsells to decline. The FTC rights most families don’t know they have. Written by a licensed funeral director. Free.
See fair prices in your area.
Enter a zip code to see what funeral services should cost in your area, by line item. No account needed. No email collected. Nothing saved.
Look up fair pricesNot sure what type of service fits?
Four short questions about faith, body, and budget. We’ll recommend a service type so you can move on to comparing prices with confidence.
Help me decide →Walk into the meeting knowing what you want.
A printable preferences worksheet. Fill it in now, save it to your browser, print it the morning of the arrangement meeting. The director sees you brought it and the conversation changes.
Open the worksheet →On prepaid funeral plans.
Many families assume prepaying is the responsible move. It often isn’t.
- Prepaid plans can lock in services your family won’t want when the time comes.
- They often carry high cancellation fees, and the money doesn’t always transfer cleanly across state lines.
- If the funeral home closes, is acquired, or changes ownership, honoring the original plan can get complicated.
- In some states, a portion of prepaid funds is not protected by trust or insurance. If the funeral home closes or is acquired before the death, recovery may be partial or zero. The Funeral Consumer Alliance maintains state-by-state guidance on prepaid plan protections.
For most families, a will, a recorded conversation about wishes, and a savings account earmarked for this purpose serve better than a prepaid plan. If you’re considering one anyway, talk to an estate attorney in your state before you sign.
This is general guidance, not legal or financial advice.
We can do the calling for you.
Planning ahead means your family won’t be making cold calls in the worst week of their life. For a flat $199 — only if they choose a home we present — we contact funeral homes near them, pull written itemized quotes, and put the options side by side in their dashboard. They make the call. We make sure they don’t miss anything.
Save this site to an account now. When the time comes, your family logs in and the process is already half-done.
If you’re helping an aging parent.
Keep this URL. If things change, you’ll want it in the first hour, not the fifth. A thirty-minute pre-need conversation now routinely saves families thousands later.