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Your life, your death

Settle the details of your funeral now to ensure your wishes will be met, and spare grieving family the stress later.

By SHARON GINN
Published September 27, 2005

Wherever he goes, Bob Merada is on the lookout for bits of history, an interest sparked long ago by a great-uncle who would tell him tales of how his ancestors used to live. He spent hours combing through records in cemeteries, and eventually moved on to scouring the Internet for information on dead family members.

There are fewer places in this world more special to Merada than the plot in tiny Bowling Green where members of his mother's family have been buried for decades. His parents are there. Eventually, Merada and his wife, Katherine, will be there too. His funeral, and Katherine's, have been planned and paid for. When the time comes, his wife or children will have to do little more than make a phone call.

Merada knows by having made these plans, he has made things easier on them. But that wasn't entirely his motivation.

"I don't know if it was a gift to my children or a gift to myself," said Merada, 69, of St. Petersburg. "I know what I'm getting. ... You know, families squabble over one thing and another. This way, they don't have anything to say about it.

"That plot down there has a lot of history for me. I don't know if I made a mark in this world, but I'm going to leave a marker saying, "This is where I was."'

People may not get to choose when they die or how, but they are increasingly choosing what will happen to their body after death, how they will be honored, what it will cost and how it will be paid for.

Those who do so usually are hoping to spare their family members not only the extra stress of making last-minute, often expensive choices but also the pain of not knowing whether they fulfilled their loved one's last wishes. But for others - especially baby boomers, who are just beginning to think about these issues - it's about control.

These days, the options are limitless. Little touches, like a Buccaneers flag draped over a casket or a party instead of a funeral, are ways to make end-of-life ceremonies more personal.

The typical funeral with casket and burial is being, if not replaced, at least rethought. Some are looking for new places to inter their cremated remains, and some are embracing a new twist on old idea, such as "green" burials that involve just a shroud and no embalming.

Cremation is becoming popular; in Florida, the cremation rate is about 50 percent compared with 29 percent nationally, according to Jack Springer, executive director of the Cremation Association of North America. Those who are cremated have almost always chosen this route ahead of time, Springer said, which translates into at least some degree of preplanning.

"One of the reasons why older people choose cremation for themselves is it's simpler to arrange," Springer said. "Also, it takes the burden off the family of "what are we going to do?' Everybody has a lot more time to decide how they want to handle the memorial."

Putting together a plan

Many people choose a more traditional route: Call a funeral home and have them handle everything, from the transportation of the body to the preparation, casket and service. But industry experts agree: Family plots like Merada's are increasingly rare, as families scatter across the country and make their lives in new, sometimes multiple, places.

When someone dies without a funeral plan, a myriad of decisions must be made quickly. These include putting together a budget and coming up with funds, finding a place to bury the body, choosing the type of service and figuring out how to gather people on short notice. All this can be difficult for family members who are coming in from out of town and have never handled such details before.

Organizations like AARP and the Funeral Consumer Alliance generally recommend making at least some of these arrangements ahead of time and they strongly advocate preplanning rather than prepaying. That is, writing your wishes down, setting aside money in a separate account, and letting family members know how to access it.

This often takes legwork and planning to learn the relative costs of different services. For those who want to be buried in a certain place, the only way to guarantee that is to pay for a burial lot ahead of time.

Those who wish to pay for everything and be done with it can visit funeral homes, pick and choose from a list of services and options and even write their obituary and the things they want in their service. Then they sign what's called a "preneed" contract, which involves either putting a lump sum in trust or purchasing an insurance plan through the funeral home. Those in the funeral services industry note that paying ahead and shopping carefully locks in current prices and can save money.

"Like with everything, the biggest advantage is education," said John McQueen of Anderson-McQueen Funeral Homes in St. Petersburg. "When you have the time to shop around, make sure you're comparing apples to apples."

Another option is purchasing a whole-life or cash-value insurance policy that can be earmarked for funeral expenses - say, $10,000 or $15,000. Buying such a policy does not guarantee a future funeral at current prices, but it allows the money to be used more flexibly upon the policyholder's death.

Take precautions

Before signing a contract, read it carefully. State law requires that all funeral home prices be itemized in detail. If you are working with a funeral home, can the policy be transferred if you move? Can you get your money back if you change your mind about your service? How difficult will it be to sell your burial lot if you decide to be cremated?

Experts say even the best plan is useless if you don't relay it to at least one other person, preferably more.

The last place to tell family about prearrangements is in a will, which probably won't be read until after the funeral. Keeping any contracts or information in a safety deposit box is also a bad idea, if relatives don't know to check it or can't get to it during a weekend or holiday.

McQueen shared the story of a family that discovered a preneed contract among their relative's possessions after paying for a funeral themselves. They got the money back from the preneed contract, but the funeral they paid for was more expensive.

"Some families still don't talk to their loved ones," McQueen said. "That's the most important thing. Make sure your family knows what your desires are."

- Times researcher Caryn Baird contribute to this report.

[Last modified September 26, 2005, 20:31:06]