How do you read a funeral price list?
Start by knowing there are three documents rather than one. The Federal Trade Commission requires a funeral home to give you a General Price List covering everything it sells, a separate casket price list before you are shown any caskets, and a separate outer burial container list if it sells them and does not price them on the General Price List. Then read the first line, because it is the one you cannot decline, and it is the only line that is genuinely comparable between homes. That line reads $1,900 at Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia and $650.00 at Tulip Cremation Northern California, and at Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama it is split across two entries the home itself totals at $2,990.00, with a $10 state administrative fee listed separately. Everything after it is optional, conditional, or an estimate.
$1,900
the non-declinable first line, at a home that itemises everything
$2,990.00
the same non-declinable line at a second home, split in two and totalled by the home
$650.00
the same line at a cremation-only provider, included in the price rather than added
Cost breakdown
Each table below comes from one source, named underneath it, with the date that source last revised the figures. Everything is a United States figure in USD.
The three lists a funeral home must give you, and when
| Document | When you get it | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| General Price List | On your visit, yours to keep | Every good and service the home offers, with the cost of each |
| Prices by telephone | On request, anonymously | Whatever you ask about |
| Casket price list | Before you see any caskets | All caskets sold. Sometimes on the General Price List, more often separate |
| Outer burial container price list | Before you see any containers | Only if the home sells them and does not price them on the General Price List |
| Itemised statement | After you decide, before you pay | Every item selected, the price of each, and the total |
| Good faith estimate | When a cost is not yet known | The items the home buys from outside vendors on your behalf |
The three groups every funeral bill divides into
| Group | Can you decline it | What sits in it |
|---|---|---|
| Basic services fee | No | Planning, permits, death certificate copies, notices, sheltering the remains, coordinating with the cemetery or crematory |
| Other services and merchandise | Yes, item by item | Transport, embalming and preparation, use of the home for a viewing or ceremony, graveside staff and equipment, hearse, limousine, casket, outer burial container, cremation or interment |
| Cash advances | Yes, usually | Flowers, obituary notices, pallbearers, officiating clergy, organists and soloists |
One home, one non-declinable charge, two lines: Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama
| Line as printed | Price | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Basic services of funeral director and staff | $1,795.00 | Staff, sheltering the remains, coordination, and the home’s overhead |
| Arranging fee | $1,595.00 | Death certificates, obituary placement, arranging musicians or hairdressers |
| Total basic charges | $2,990.00 | The home totals the two itself, which is the figure to compare |
| State administrative fee | $10 | Listed separately, for each final disposition, under an Alabama rule |
| Offering A, traditional funeral service | $4,690.00 | A package, available only with a casket bought from this home |
| Offering C, no visitation and no embalming | $3,540.00 | The same package with two things removed |
| Embalming, bought separately | $1,150.00 | Not required by law, which this list states |
A bar for each row of the table above, 7 of them, drawn to the same scale so the spread is visible at a glance. The figure beside each bar is the one the table prints.
What changes the price
- Find every line you cannot decline before anything else
- It is the only figure that compares cleanly between homes, because everything else depends on what you choose. At Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia it is one line at $1,900. At Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama it is two lines the home totals at $2,990.00, with a $10 state administrative fee listed separately. At Tulip Cremation Northern California it is $650.00 and is already inside the cremation price rather than added to it.
- Read what a package excludes, not what it includes
- The inclusion list is the selling copy; the condition is the price. Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama states that its package offerings are available only with a casket bought from that home, so a $4,690.00 package is a floor with a casket still to come.
- Treat "and up" as an unpriced line
- A starting price is not a price, and price lists use them for the items that vary most. Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia publishes caskets from $1,800 to $33,000, vaults from $1,595 and escorts from $375, which is three lines where the list tells you where the number begins and not where it ends.
- Check whether the list carries an effective date
- A price list without one cannot be compared with anything, including its own earlier version. All three lists quoted on this site carry one, and they differ by six months: Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia is effective 1 April 2026, Tulip Cremation Northern California 29 July 2026, and Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama is in effect as of 1 October 2026, replacing its previous list.
- Separate the cash advances from the home’s own charges
- These are things bought from someone else on your behalf, and you can often buy them yourself. The Federal Trade Commission names flowers, obituary notices, pallbearers, officiating clergy, organists and soloists, and requires a home that adds a fee on top to say so in writing without having to say how much.
- Ask for the casket list before you see a casket
- The order matters, and the Rule sets it deliberately: you are entitled to the written list first so you can ask about the ones not on display. Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia publishes caskets from $1,800 to $33,000 and a rental casket from $890 for a viewing before a cremation.
How to pay less
- Carry one number between homes: the total you cannot decline
- It survives every difference in how lists are laid out. Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama prints $1,795.00 first and totals its non-declinable charges at $2,990.00, and only the second figure can be set against the $1,900 at Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia.
- Get the prices by telephone before you visit
- The Federal Trade Commission requires a funeral director to give price information by telephone if you ask, and states that you do not have to give your name, address or telephone number first. That turns three visits into three calls.
- Buy the cash advance items yourself where you can
- Flowers, notices and musicians are bought from other businesses, and the Federal Trade Commission allows a home to add an undisclosed fee for handling them. Anything you arrange directly cannot carry that fee.
- Decline the items the law does not require
- Embalming and outer burial containers are the two most often assumed. Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama prices embalming at $1,150.00 and says on its own list that it is not required by law, and the Federal Trade Commission states that no state law requires an outer burial container anywhere in the United States.
- Write the lines down in the same order at every home
- Lists are laid out differently on purpose and comparing them in place is how a total grows quietly. The checklist on this site puts the three Federal Trade Commission groups in a fixed order so the same line lands in the same place each time.
Questions
How many price lists am I entitled to?
Three, in the usual case. The Federal Trade Commission requires a General Price List covering everything the home sells, a casket price list before you are shown any caskets, and an outer burial container price list if the home sells containers and does not price them on the General Price List.
Which line is the one that matters most?
The one you cannot decline, because it is the only figure that compares between homes before you have chosen anything. Watch for it being split: Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama prints a basic services fee of $1,795.00 and an arranging fee of $1,595.00 and totals them itself at $2,990.00. The same list prints a $10 state administrative fee separately for each final disposition.
Does the home have to publish the list online?
Not under federal law. The California Cemetery and Funeral Bureau goes further than the federal rule and requires a funeral establishment with a website either to post its General Price List there or to list all its goods and services there and give you the list on request. That is a state requirement rather than a national one.
What does "and up" mean on a price list?
That the line is not priced. It is used for the items that vary most, and it tells you where a number starts rather than what it will be. Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia publishes caskets from $1,800 to $33,000, which is the widest single line on any list quoted on this site.
What is a cash advance and why does it matter?
It is something the funeral home buys from an outside vendor for you, such as flowers, an obituary notice or the officiating clergy. It matters because the Federal Trade Commission lets the home add its own fee on top, requires that fee to be disclosed in writing, and does not require the home to say how large it is.
Can I take the list away with me?
Yes. The Federal Trade Commission states that the General Price List the home gives you when you visit is yours to keep, which is what makes comparing two homes possible at all.
Where these figures come from
The rules on this page are federal and come from the Federal Trade Commission, with one state addition from the California Cemetery and Funeral Bureau, and all of them are linked below. Every price used as an example is a figure published by the provider named beside it, in US dollars, from its own General Price List: Plummer Funeral Home, Decatur, Georgia effective 1 April 2026, Tulip Cremation Northern California effective 29 July 2026, and Dryden Funeral Home, Heflin, Alabama in effect as of 1 October 2026. The Plummer and Tulip lists were read on 23 September 2026 and the Dryden list on 9 October 2026. The examples show how lists differ in shape and are not a national average of anything. No state other than California was checked for its own requirements, so none is claimed.