Practical
Cemeteries and crematories
Almost everything families find confusing about the cost of a burial comes from not knowing that two organisations are involved. We are one. The cemetery is the other, and its bill is frequently the larger of the two.
Why there is not a single name on this page
This page names no cemetery and no crematory. There are several large, old and well-run ones within twenty minutes of this address, and a real funeral home would list them by name. Woodside Memorial is a demonstration, and printing a real cemetery's name beside an invented business would suggest a relationship that nobody has agreed to.
The decision is part of the argument rather than a gap in it. Everything below is the shape of the charges and the questions to ask, and none of it depends on which cemetery you end up choosing — which is also the honest answer to what a funeral home can usefully tell you about them in advance. A real one would give you three or four names, say which office is easiest to deal with, and let you ring them yourself.
Two bills, two diaries
What a cemetery charges for
A grave is bought from a cemetery, not from a funeral home. So is the right to open it, so is the care of it, and so, usually, is the requirement for a container around the casket. We deal with that office for you and its charges appear on our bill because somebody has to pay them on the day — but they are set by the cemetery and we add nothing to them.
| Charged for | What it is |
|---|---|
| The grave, or the niche | Bought outright, and it is a purchase of a right of burial rather than of land. |
| Opening and closing | Charged every time the grave is opened, so a second burial in the same grave years later is charged again. |
| The outer container | Many cemeteries require a liner or a vault around the casket so the ground does not settle. Whether one is needed is their rule. |
| Perpetual or annual care | Maintenance of the grounds, charged once or charged yearly depending on the cemetery. |
| A surcharge for a Saturday, a Sunday or a holiday | Common, and worth asking about before a day is fixed. |
| The headstone's foundation | The stone is a monument dealer's job. The concrete it stands on is usually the cemetery's, and it is a separate charge. |
The row that catches families out is the second one. Opening and closing is charged every time the grave is opened, so a plot bought for two people is not a single purchase made once; it is a purchase now and a charge again years later, at whatever the charge is by then. The Saturday surcharge is the other one, and it is the reason we ask early which day of the week you have in mind rather than after the family has agreed on one.
The headstone is not on that table at all. A monument dealer makes and sets it, it usually happens months after the funeral, and the concrete foundation it stands on is generally the cemetery's charge rather than the dealer's. That means a headstone typically arrives as two bills from two organisations, neither of which is us.
The other one
What a crematory charges for
A crematory's list is much shorter, which is most of why cremation costs less. It is not because the ceremony is smaller — you can have exactly the same service either way — but because the second organisation's bill is a fraction of the size.
| Charged for | What it is |
|---|---|
| The cremation itself | A single fee, which we pass on at what it costs us. |
| Witnessing, if you want it | Usually a small additional charge for the room and the time. |
| A niche or a plot for the ashes | Only if you want the ashes placed somewhere rather than kept. |
The last row on that table is the one people forget to think about. Ashes kept at home cost nothing further; ashes placed in a niche or buried in a plot mean a cemetery is involved again, with a purchase, a marker and possibly a care charge. Neither is more correct than the other, and there is no deadline on deciding.
Cremation also takes longer to authorise than burial rather than less, because the permit needs more signatures. Anybody who describes it as the quick option is describing the ceremony and not the process.
Before a day is fixed
What to ask, and ask early
These are the questions that move a funeral by a week when they are asked late, and cost nothing at all when they are asked on the first day. Ask them of the cemetery, not of us — we will make the call with you if that is easier.
- Does the family already own a grave, and where is the deed?
- Who is named on that deed, and are they still alive?
- How many burials has that grave already had, and how many will it take?
- Does the cemetery require an outer container, and of what kind?
- What does it charge for the day of the week you have in mind?
- Is there a charge for perpetual care, and is it once or yearly?
The deed
If the family thinks it owns a grave, find the paper today
If the family thinks it owns a grave and cannot find the deed, start on that the same day. Cemetery offices keep good records and are usually helpful, but they will not open a grave on the strength of a family's memory, and that is the delay that moves a funeral by a week.
This is the single most common cause of a delayed burial in this neighbourhood, and it is almost never anybody's fault. A grave bought two generations ago belongs to somebody named on a document nobody has looked at since, that person may have died, and the right to authorise an opening passes in an order the cemetery has to be satisfied about before it will put a spade in the ground.
So: find the deed, read the name on it, and tell us what it says. If the name is somebody who has died, say so at once rather than at the end — it is a solvable problem with a few days in hand and an unsolvable one on the morning of the funeral.
Families frequently believe the whole cost of a burial came from us. It is worth knowing which half is which before you compare two funeral homes, because the half we control is the smaller one.
The cemetery's charges are not ours. The grave, its opening and closing, any required outer container and the care of the plot are bought from the cemetery, and we pass them on at what they cost.
- We do not sell the grave — the cemetery does, and its bill is often larger than ours.
- Burial — what we do and what the cemetery does, set out side by side.
- Veterans' entitlements — a national cemetery grave costs the family nothing, and what it trades is the journey on the day.
If you do not know whether the family owns a grave
Ring and describe what you have found. We will tell you what the cemetery is going to ask for and how to get it, before it becomes the thing holding the funeral up.