42 LONGISLANDPRESS.COM • NOVEMBER 2019
WHY FUNERALS COST MORE ON LI
TAKE ON EVERYTHING
LONG ISLAND
HAS TO OFFER TODAY
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JOURNEY TO LIFE EVER AFTER
Michael Lanotte, the executive
director of the New York State Funeral
Directors Association, notes
that funeral homes often disclose
pricing on their websites.
"We have a public awareness campaign
called Good at Goodbyes and
a website
with information for planning funerals,”
he says. “We try to ensure
that our funeral directors work
with consumers.”
As for the local funerals, the high costs
are due to a familiar expense: taxes.
“You have to look at the daily cost of
running a funeral home,” says Stephen
Graziano, manager at Krauss
Funeral Home in Franklin Square.
“We always try to keep our funeral
costs as low as possible.”
Large Long Island funeral homes
on big lots can pay from $60,000 to
$100,000 a year in real estate taxes,
according to Graziano. He also said
staff members at Krauss are paid
well enough to live here and get
medical benefits and pensions.
And while his business works with
everyone’s budget, including having
a widely priced range of casket
choices, there are costs out of their
control, such as the cemetery, where
grave openings can run $2,200 and
up. They are most expensive on
Saturdays.
When her husband died unexpectedly
in 2017, Wantagh resident
Stephanie Anderson had the difficult
task of planning his funeral,
which cost $12,000.
“I didn’t want him displayed in a
funeral home,” Anderson says.
“My Greek church laid him out open
casket on the altar for two hours
prior to the funeral. My husband is
buried at Calverton because he’s a
Vietnam veteran, otherwise I would
have had that expense as well. So
my husband’s $12,000 funeral did
not include funeral home services
or burial.”
Vigliante says prices vary with
options.
“Some people want to be very elaborate
and some want to be basic, and
some want to be in the middle,” he
says.
He also points to the cost of opening
graves for a casket. The burial
of ashes cost much less, noting the
range is from $2,800 to $3,000.
“Cemeteries give me the prices every
year and they go up eight to 10
percent,” he says. “The cremation
rate on Long Island is about 50
percent,” and a savings in terms of
funeral costs.
Families can also cut costs by
driving themselves to funerals
instead of hiring limousines
that can cost around $500 each.
The average family hires three,
Vigliante says.
But some cost-cutting measures are
better than others. Graziano says
families sometimes order caskets
online rather than from the funeral
home.
“I’ve had some caskets come in here,
bought online from third-party vendors,
that were in no condition for
burial," he says.
"One of the most expensive places to live is
Nassau and Suffolk counties so, of course, that
trickles down to every business, not just the
funeral business," says John Vigliante.
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