Content area
Full Text
THERE ARE MANY WAYS to memorialize the dead, but one constant is that a little forethought and communication - before you go - can save your family a lot of money and grief after you're gone
A few times a month, Billy Pa helps paddle an outrigger canoe about a quarter mile off Waikiki Beach. That's where families and friends say goodbye to loved ones and scatter their ashes. ¶ "I think the reason people do it is because they have a love of the ocean," Pa says. ¶ It's the general area where the ashes of Duke Kahanamoku, Don Ho and hundreds of other people have been left over the decades. Pa wants his ashes scattered there, too, and so does his wife.
TODAY, THERE ARE MANY Ways to say goodbye to the departed, and lots of families are opting for alternatives to traditional funerals and burials. The reasons vary, including saving money or the environment, and memorializing a person in a unique way that seems appropriate to their lives. One thing that is true about all of these ways: A little planning while you're still here means fewer costs and less confusion for your family when you're gone, funeral directors and morticians say.
"Most people don't want to talk about it and certainly don't want to think about it. But, then, all of a sudden family members are emotional and grieving, and that's not the right time to make economic decisions," says Bodhi Be, a founder of the Death Store on Maui, a service of a nonprofit called Doorway Into Light.
Cremation Saves Money
The cheapest option is cremation, which can start at $775 at a nonprofit provider like Oahu Mortuary. But once families get into traditional funerals and burials, the costs quickly add up, including items such as the casket, flowers, prayer cards and extended ceremonies.
"They start nickel and diming the families," says Blanca Acevez Eberhardt, funeral services manager at Oahu Mortuary. "The calculator just keeps ticking."
Sometimes the total cost can soar past $37,000, and that doesn't necessarily include the burial plot. Some funerals can even reach six figures.
At Oahu Mortuary, funeral services start at the low end of industry standards, around $3,000. But that doesn't include the...