Undertaken With Love

Photo of Virginia state capitol by jimmywayne22

This state's status: Virginia does not restrict the right of families to care for their own dead.

The following is excerpted with permission from the brochure "Home Funerals in Virginia: A Revived Tradition" by Funeral Consumers Alliance of the Virginia Blue Ridge:

If you choose to bury your own dead, you have to file a death certificate, signed by the attending physician or coroner. The local health department requires this document within 72 hours. For cremation, you also need a cremation permit. You must also
provide a casket or suitable container and make arrangements directly with the cemetery or crematory.

The dying person can write or dictate his after-death wishes (a Funeral Consumer Alliance planning form or the “Before I Go, You Should Know” booklet would be fine) and arrange for a “Payable Upon Death” bank trust account naming an agent to receive money to cover final expenses.

The family can agree ahead of time who is to direct things and who will do which tasks. Lacking a family, the dying person can choose an agent, using an Advance Health Care Directive, to take charge of the disposition of the body.

The agent may need to locate a willing crematory operator or cemetery to work with, find or make the burial or cremation box and decorate it if desired, and make sure the hospice, the hospital, the nursing home, or all people at home know that this will be a
home-directed funeral, so no one has the body picked up by a funeral home. If the death is unexpected, the medical examiner must be notified and an autopsy may be needed. The coroner needs to know whom to call when the body can be released.

A van, pickup truck, or SUV may be used for transporting the body. Two people may be needed for carrying the body and container. Handles or cut-outs in the burial container make it easier to move. If the body is to be cremated, someone needs to arrange to pick up the ashes after the cremation for scattering or interment.

The family may dig the grave themselves if on their own land or consult the cemetery administration as to the process of digging the grave in a cemetery: with attention to location, width, and depth of the grave and whether a liner is required.

If the body is to be cremated, all contents of the box must be combustible. Pacemakers have to be removed because the batteries would explode and damage the retort, but artificial joints and other surgical miscellany may be left.

Legal Matters and Paperwork

If there is time to plan ahead, it is helpful to have a list of all the known sources of death benefits, the location of current and unpaid bills, the most significant persons in the life of the dying one and how to contact them, and the location of important papers, and relevant combinations, passwords, and other information that would help the one
administering the estate and/or funeral.

Information Needed for the Death Certificate:

A blank death certificate may be obtained from the county public health department. It must be completed in black ink, and taken to the person’s physician for signature and filling in the cause of death. It must be filed within 72 hours of death with the Department of Health. The form is in duplicate.

Needed information includes the address of the decedent, military service dates and discharge (there could be death benefits coming) names of each parent, occupation of the decedent, educational level, social security number, birth and death dates, marital status, and cemetery or final disposition plans,

A cremation permit will be necessary if you are using a crematory. This may also be obtained at the county public health department after you have the certified Death Certificate.

The cemetery will need a copy of the approved Death Certificate before accepting the body. Additional certified Death Certificates are necessary for collecting death benefits and transferring property and accounts. It is a good idea to get several copies
from the registrar.

Other Options

•  The family can choose to do only part of the after-death care, leaving the rest to a funeral home.
• The body can be kept refrigerated at the mortuary and be delivered to the home for services.
• The mortuary may transport the body.
• The mortuary may be used for getting the death certificate and cremation permit.
• The mortuary may be used for obtaining the casket or alternative container.
• The mortuary may agree to allow a family member to wash and dress the body at the funeral home but provide all the other services itself.

(End of excerpt)

Searchable Online General Statutes

Code of Virginia (external link)

Resources Specific to Funeral Law

Board of Funeral Directors & Embalmers (external link)

Department of Health (external link)

Virginia Cemetery Board (external link)

"Death Outside the Box" (a brochure by FCA of the Virginia Blue Ridge)

Please help us develop this section by emailing us with other books or online sources specifically related to funeral law in Virginia.

In general, regulations promulgated by departments of health, such as required procedures in filing death certificates, must be followed by families caring for their own dead, while regulations promulgated by funeral service regulatory boards are binding only on funeral providers (but may affect home funerals indirectly to the extent that a family chooses to engage the limited services of licensed providers or in a few states is required to do so).

Resources Specific to Home Funeral Laws

Please help us develop this section by emailing us with books or online sources specifically related to home funerals in Virginia. Or if there is none, write a summary document regarding your findings to share here! (See North Carolina and South Carolina for examples.)

Organizations and Individuals

Funeral Consumers Alliance chapters (external link). Because FCA chapters are composed of volunteers, their expertise and experience related to home funeral laws vary considerably from one to the next. All of them, however, welcome home funeral practitioners and advocates and are eager to learn from them. If you find that you are accumulating knowledge that is lacking in your closest chapter, why don't you volunteer to be its resource for funeral consumers on home funeral laws in your state?

Please help us develop this section by emailing us with the names of organizations and individuals that serve as noncommercial resources to families serving as their own funeral directors in Virginia. Please include contact information (phone, website, email).