Selling Burial Plots

[fetam]

So I have had at least half of my appointments ask me if I could help them sell their burial plots. All of them are either because they are in a different state than they currently want to buried in or they have extras because of a new marriage, or their parents bought a lot of them in the 50's or something. Keep in mind, they all have new plots in the town they want to be buried in so these are just extras.

I would love to be able to help these people out and use the profits to fund an FE policy for them. They like the idea, but I have no idea where to peddle these things for them. Thx!

 

[VolAgent]

unusedburialplots.com, not quite as brisk a business as usedburialplots.com.



Honestly, try eBay, the classifieds, sell it back to the cemetery?

 

[Newby]

The cemetery won't buy them.

Here is what you can do. I have a friend who does preneed and FE in Tennessee and he makes a LOT of extra income selling unwanted cemetery spaces and mausoleum.

Tell them that individual cemetery spaces usually sell for about half price of what the cemetery charges today. (This is true) So if the cemetery charges $1,000 they can usually unload it through classified ads for around $500. They will also have to pay a transfer fee of around $50 at the cemetery.

If you sell FE you are exposed to a lot of people who are needing to BUY cemetery spaces and can mention them to people IF they are in that price range.

OR if they want to just sell them today you will buy them for about half what the going price is $250 each. Most people who have these spaces either didn't pay anything for them or bought them years ago for around $50 to $100 so they will gladly sell them to you for a great price.

Then YOU can sell them and make a profit. My friend sells at least 2-mausoleum spaces a month this way and makes several thousand dollars each time and SAVES his clients 50% on their crypts! This builds great customer loyality.

The one thing you have to watch out for is to make sure the seller has OWNERSHIP rights to the spaces not BURIAL rights. That's like the difference in being the owner of an insurance policy or the beneficiary of the policy...actually it's worse.

If the person with ownership rights dies and never transfered the ownership rights legally, ALL of his decendents have equal burial rights but can NEVER sell the spaces because no one will ever have ownership rights again. (This could be different in some states.)

 

[fetam]

Thanks Newby! I appreciate a straight answer. I did call the funeral home and they said that they wouldn't buy them back. They also said that there is a $95 deed transfer fee. They said the best place to resell them is in the classifieds locally. He even gave me a fair price to sell them at compared to what they sell them for now.

I don't think I need to make any money off of this, but show the client that I will go the extra mile for them. It will pay off in the long run with cross sales and referrals...I hope anyways!

 

[AttillaTheOne]

There are BILLIONS of dollars worth of Burial Plots in this country that will never be used.
Unless you want to spend a LOT of time learning how to market burial plots and get good at it like Newbury's buddy, tell the folks what the cemetery guy told you and GET BACK TO SELLING INSURANCE!

I used to work for a cemetery and NO ONE THERE gives a darn about helping someone sell unused property because we made money by selling NEW property to a NEW client.

Best of luck.

 

[billyg]

I haven't tied them but here is a resource worth exploring:

Buy and Sell Cemetery Burial Plots, Masusoleums, Burial Lots, Vaults, Crypts