Death is driving Americans into debt

Key Points:

• The average U.S. family spends over $7,000 on funeral and related expenses, with costs rising 310% since 1986 and often exceeding $10,000 when including cemetery plots and headstones, leading 37% of families in 2025 to incur debt.
• Funeral homes charge mandatory basic service fees averaging $2,495, with additional costs for caskets, embalming, and grave opening, while price transparency is low as only 18% of funeral homes list prices online, creating a costly and opaque market for grieving families.
• Industry consolidation has increased profit motives, with corporations controlling about 20% of funeral homes and often maximizing fees, prompting calls for legislation to help survivors manage these expenses more affordably.
• Survivors face additional financial and administrative burdens from probate processes, which can consume 3% to 8% of an estate’s value and hundreds of hours in paperwork, further complicating the aftermath of a loved one’s death.
• The report recommends policy changes including mandatory online price disclosure by funeral homes, raising Social Security death benefits, creating a federal life insurance program, reforming probate fees, expanding small estate thresholds, providing accessible will-making tools, and establishing a national death-notification portal to ease survivors’ financial and administrative challenges.