SHOWING LOVE EVEN AFTER YOU'RE GONE

     Recently, my father passed away and, as the named executor in his will, I have had to address, first hand, ​some of the issues facing families as they deal with the loss of a loved one.

  

     One of the biggest impacts initially on us was the fact that my father had already made and paid for his funeral arrangements.  I cannot tell you how much that helped us.  During a tough time like the death of a family member, it is doubly difficult to make so many decisions regarding burial or cremation.  It is easy to get lulled into making decisions that can have long lasting effects.  Such decisions regarding the funeral can be very expensive and eat up a significant part of the decedent's estate.  Funeral homes are only too happy to sell you that gold casket with the hand woven silk liner for twenty thousand dollars.    And if the estate cannot pay, issues of who will pay the funeral costs have caused more than a few family rifts.

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     If you are thinking about writing a will, please also consider making your own final arrangements.  These two things are the kindest, most loving things you can do to help your loved ones after your passing.  Your loved ones will be struggling with your loss.  The fact that you wrote and executed a will and made your own funeral arrangements will be a huge burden off of their shoulders.   You will be making choices for yourself that otherwise would have to be made by a suffering family member during a hard time.  

 

     I can personally tell you that these two acts, the will and the funeral arrangements, helped us in so many ways.  We didn't have to select a casket or music or deal with the funeral home hardly at all.  The funeral home handled everything just as they had been contracted to do.  In fact, we only had to order death certificates and pay for the obituary.  That was it!  We were free to focus on the life of the deceased and not on the trappings and expenses of his passing.

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     Also, make sure to tell your family about your arrangements so that someone in the family knows.  In my case, I was surprised that I was the only one that knew.  If I hadn't, we could have paid again for the funeral, especially if we had decided to bury him elsewhere or through another funeral home.

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   To wrap it up, some of the best advice I can give another person is to get a will and make your own funeral or cremation arrangements.  It will be a last act of love that will mean so very much to your beloved family.  And again, make sure family knows about it.  It will ease your mind and remove a source of worry for you and your beloved family.

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     And when it comes time to probate your loved one's will, contact Jack Tarrant.  We know what it takes to get the will admitted to probate and you on your way to settling the estate.