Pre-planning can help save money on final arrangements

By Charles Christian

Although the funeral industry has seen costs rise due to inflation, local experts and residents are recommending ways to reduce costs for final arrangements.

Todd Meierhoffer of Meierhoffer Funeral Home and Crematory said that even though the death of a loved one can be emotionally devastating, there are ways to ease the financial burden of a funeral. It all begins with pre-planning, he said.

“There’s actually two parts of pre-arranging,” Meierhoffer said. “The first part is gathering information. I really tell people that this is about 51%.”

Gathering information from loved ones is a sure way to make sure their wishes are upheld when loved ones are working with the funeral home about the service itself.

“The next part of pre-arrangement involves funding,” Meierhoffer said. “You can lock in today’s price, and we’ll guarantee all the services, and there will be no additional charges at time of death.”

Longtime St. Joseph resident Joyce West, whose husband recently passed away, said that both the service planning and the pre-payment aspects of the funeral can make a big difference, especially since death can come unexpectedly.

“I think it’s great to pre-plan,” West said. “If you don’t have a lot of money, you can’t come up with that kind of money if you don’t pre-plan.”

The amount of money West described can be several thousand dollars. In Missouri, the average cost of a traditional funeral with burial is over $8,700. Cremation, which is becoming a more accepted and popular alternative to traditional burials, can cost around $2,000 less on average.

“Cremation provides flexibility in both accommodation and in price,” Meierhoffer said. “The days of mom and dad and kids living the same community don’t exist anymore.”

Larger funeral homes like Meierhoffer often provide access to both kinds of burial, including parts of the funeral grounds specifically for the interment of ashes and urns. West said she and her husband requested cremation, and when her time comes, her wishes are that their ashes would be interred together.

Regardless of financial situation, Meierhoffer said that reputable funeral homes of all sizes will find ways to work with families to provide a balance between affordability and meeting the family’s burial needs in a dignified way.

Pre-planning is the ideal way to do this, but Meierhoffer said their goal — and the goal of any reputable funeral home — is for loved ones to know they will be served in the best way possible.