Dying can be expensive, but cost-conscious Kiwis are finding a range of ways to creatively say goodbye on a budget.
The cost of a simple funeral ranges between $6000 and $8000, with Consumer New Zealand estimating the average cost at somewhere between $8000 and $10,000.
The biggest costs are usually the coffin and the funeral services – such as a director and embalming – all of which can cost thousands of dollars each.
Frances Potter, who has just taken over the running of the DIY Funeral website, estimates her mother’s funeral cost about $1000, and could have been lower.
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For comparison, Christchurch-based funeral directors Lamb & Hayward – which has a Consumer Trusted accreditation from Consumer NZ – lists seven funeral scenarios on its website, ranging in price from about $7000 to almost $22,000.
The lowest cost option includes just two things – nearly $2100 for a casket and a professional service fee of nearly $4900.
Potter said many people didn’t realise how much of a funeral they could organise themselves.
“A lot of people don’t know you don’t have to use a funeral director, you don’t have to embalm a body, and that you can transport a body yourself.”
For those on modest incomes, particularly when the deceased has little or no savings or assets, finding the money to pay a funeral director can be a struggle. So here are some ways to cut costs.
KAI SCHWOERER/Stuff
A coffin made at the Rangiora Menz Shed.
Build your own coffin
Funeral Directors Association of NZ CEO Gillian Boyes said caskets could cost from $1000 up to $15,000.
Potter built her mother’s casket out of pallets, while her sister lined it.
She also built the coffin for a friend she’d been to art school with, who died in 2022.
“We all came together. Basically I built the coffin. We all sat around decorating it. It was beautiful.”
She has now started making coffins for other people, with a flat pack version made from basic building materials costing $395.
Supplied/Mike Nelson
A bare plywood coffin with an absorbent liner, handles and lid screws that Carried Away sells for $680
Mike Nelson’s company Carried Away makes 15–20 coffins a month, from either MDF or plywood. The lowest price is $440 for a direct to the crematorium casket not suitable for a service, he said.
A basic MDF flat pack coffin cost $580, and a plywood flat pack was $680. There was no freight charge on the flat packs.
Rent a coffin
You don’t have to buy a coffin, and it might make sense not to if there’s a cremation coming at the end anyway.
Many funeral homes offer a rental coffin service, by which the body is in a liner, within the coffin, and is removed afterward for cremation. This can cost several hundred dollars, instead of thousands.
123rf
A hearse isn’t always required. (File photo)
Transport the coffin yourself
Although Covid regulations ended up getting in the way of Potter’s plans, the original plan had been to transport her mum in a van to the crematorium when she died.
The pandemic rules meant she had to find a funeral director to do it, and after spending all day looking she finally found someone who would transport the body for a fraction of the cost being quoted by others.
Belmont, founder of the DIY Funeral website, said he knew a family who transported a body from Tauranga to Feilding after a funeral director quoted $6000 to do it.
Note that by law, when a body is removed from a mortuary it must be in a coffin or other suitable receptacle.
Stuff/Stuff
The Funeral Directors Association said the average cost for the burial part of a funeral service, including the plot, was above $4000, with costs varying widely around the country.
Don’t have a funeral director
Boyes from the Funeral Directors Association said it was possible for people to have DIY funerals, although there were some exceptions.
Funeral directors check that all the legal requirements and documents for burial or cremation are in order, so if you don’t use one, you need to make sure you fulfil requirements such as registering the death, and getting confirmation of the cause of death.
Save on embalming costs
The New Zealand Embalmers Association website said embalming was only compulsory when a body was being sent to another country.
Boyes said bodies needed to be hygienically cleaned, but they did not have to be embalmed. Instead, a body might be refrigerated, or dry ice could be used to keep the temperature of the body down.
Belmont said a commonly used procedure was to keep a body cool by packing bags of party ice – wrapped in towels to catch the condensation – around it.
Potter urged people to talk about funeral plans well before the person involved died. “It’s much better to have the conversation and make plans. People who do that will find ways to save money much better than people caught on the hop,” she said.