| Conina said: Sorry about the offtopic, but $20,000 for a funeral? Are these normal prices in the US? My Mom died 3 years ago and the total costs were below €8,000, even with the 30-year fee for a double-grave. |
Unfortunately yes, to the point people who couldnt afford it are looking into cremation due to how expensive burying is.
We buried my dad in India because that is what he wanted.
The travel costs to ship his body was $5,000
I had the choice of either shipping his body in a bag which would have been free or in a casket (cheapest was $2,000) - I chose the casket.
The services (embalming, death certificate, video streaming, facilities, etc) cost $10,000
So more like $17,000 but my mom had to go to India to deliver the body (her plane ticket was $3,000, would have been $2,000 but there was an issue with the ticket booking and had to cancel it, buying a next day ticket cost another $1,000 so which is why it was $3,000) and do the funeral there (which cost another $1,000 including the service and the casket because the American Casket was too big for the graves in India).
Despite all that cost, the price would have been the same because apparently buying a grave cost between $7,000 to $10,000 depending on where, the further away, the cheaper but it was in different city so not really worth it....wouldnt been right to bury him alongside strangers especially after he asked for years to be buried alongside my grandma and our other ancestors at our church in India (hundreds of years of ancestors are all buried at a specific plot of land at the church).
(I couldnt go because my wife was pregnant and almost due - my daughter was born 3 weeks after my dad passed and literally 2 days after my mom came back from India/funeral).
