Once you have recorded your wishes, you may wish to look at the benefits of prepaying your funeral.

To prepay your funeral, we would look at the cost of the funeral and merchandise you have selected for your funeral, and we would come up with a cost.  This would then guarentee the funeral costs.  The funds would be invested by the funeral home, in your name (the funds are always your funds, and you can retrieve them at any time).

When the time comes to use your prepayment funds for your funeral, we would cash in your investment on behalf of your estate, and apply the funds to the funeral expenses.  If the investment and the accured interest is less than the cost of the funeral expensesat the current costs with inflation, then the estate would not have any futher costs relating to the items that were prepaid, since the funeral was guarenteed when the pre-arrangement was paid in full.  However, if the investment with the accrued interest is greater than the current cost of the funeral expenses, then the excess funds are refunded to the estate.  It is a win-win situation, whereby if the investment under-performs, the estate does not have to pay any more, and if the investment over-performs, the excess goes back to the estate.

The following is a table to show an example based on a $5,000 prepaid funeral

If there are excess funds to be refunded to the estate, it is regarded as taxable income.  However, if the family wish to apply any excess interest to other funeral related expenses that might arise at the time of the funeral (ie. flowers, monuments, etc.), it can be used tax-free, meaning the estate saves the income tax on the investment interest.

If you would like more information on prepaying your funeral, and the benefits to doing so, just give us a call.