Cemetery Plot Help

In My Humble Opinion
1

Hi, everyone. Happy Friday. In an effort to ensure that I’m consistently providing mediocre to poor content here on the SDMB and not a whole lot more, I thought I’d pose this question to you all, because frankly, nobody in real life (no offense intended - I presume all of you are “real” - I just mean real life by MY life) has been able to help me at all. Any experiences/anecdotes/advice is welcome. Thanks in advance!

My son and I have two cemetery plots that are in our names at Oak Hill Cemetery in Chicago at 119th and Kedzie. These two plots were a group of four that were purchased by my mother’s parents back in the 40’s/50’s and then left to my mother, who then gave them to my son and I as she’ll be buried in Arizona with my dad. The deed is my and my son’s name. For various reasons, neither of us want these as we won’t be using them. We’ve already both made other arrangements that don’t involve spending eternity buried next to my grandparents. So we wish to sell them.

I first called the cemetery to make sure that all the documentation was in order - and it was. There will be a fee associated with retitling the land once they are sold to the new buyer - this cost would be $350 for the two. It is our intention to have the buyer pay these fees.

Our first problem comes in that we have NO IDEA how much to ask for these two plots. I have gone to various websites and the cost for burial plots in various cemeteries in Chicago are all over the board - I took an average (and I’m not good at math so this may be nuts to begin with) but we were thinking maybe $1,000 each, the $350 cost of changing the deed to the buyer’s name being part of that price. They are in an old part of the cemetery so it’s pretty - at least it was last time I was there (which hasn’t been since I was like in my early teens - I’ll be 50 next year) so we figured perhaps that wasn’t TOO far off? But we have NO IDEA. The cemetery itself wouldn’t help with pricing - they said it was a conflict of interest as they still have their own plots to sell.

Our next hurdle is HOW to sell them. Like I said above, I checked some places on the web where you can list cemetery plots for sale (it’s like a big database) but it costs money and frankly, neither of us is willing to pay it. I also asked the cemetery (she was a very nice lady and spent a bunch of time on the phone with me - I think she may have been bored) and she said that in her experience (many years), she’s never EVER seen a cemetery plot sold on Craigslist. She said the other things I may consider doing is posting a notice on my home church bulletin board, or asking our family funeral home. I called my pastor and he said sure, send me something for the bulletin board but that he’d, in all his experience, had never seen a plot sold that way (and he should know - he’s been my pastor since I was 15) but send an ad along anyway. Next, I called the funeral home that buries/buried most of my people, and while nice and happy to hear from me on a POSITIVE note, they said that they really weren’t in the cemetery business but if they thought of something they’d let me know. I asked both the pastor and the funeral home about donating the plots - and they both said that that was SO much trouble that it wouldn’t be worth the time. Both of them said that they didn’t even SEE people buying cemetery plots like they used to - people just aren’t being “buried” anymore. I don’t know what they’re doing with deceased and didn’t want to ask, but they ought to know - they’re in the business. Finally, I called my hometown newspaper to find out what an ad would cost. It had been bought up by the Chicago Tribune. Forget it. Those things run close to the cost of a funeral. :rolleyes:

We also considered donation, however, with the small bit of research that I did, I haven’t found a good way to go about it - we’d prefer to donate to veterans, but it turns out that a lot of cemeteries have plots that are strictly FOR this and these things are handled by the cemetery. And the cemetery won’t buy my plots from me to donate to someone, especially when they have empty ones they’re trying to get rid of.

So our questions are this:

  1. Have you ever sold a cemetery plot?

  2. What mechanism did you use? Newspaper ad? Church ad? Craigslist?

  3. How do I know what to ask for it? I assume that it would depend on where it is located which is why I mentioned where in the Chicagoland area it is.

  4. Have you ever DONATED a cemetery plot? How?

Help, guys. This is making me crazy, and frankly, I’d like to get this settled soon - I’m tired of going around and around about this and would love to be done with this. This is also somewhat of a scouting expedition, because once I sell my two successfully, my brother has two in another cemetery that he wants to sell too, but is unwilling to invest any time into figuring out how.

Sigh.

Thank you!

2

I’ve never sold one but I have seen ads in the newspaper for them.

3

I see ads in the paper quite often, but I would say online would be the way to go. I know that would be the first place I would look.

Check out:

www.gravesolutions.con

and

Both sites have very active Chicago/Illinois sections.

4

Thanks, LurkerInNJ, but I already checked both those sites and they charge to place an ad, unfortunately. That’s one of the things we’re trying to avoid.

But who knows, maybe we’ll have to bite the bullet - but that will be far down the road, unfortunately, and we’d like to get this done as soon as possible and as cheaply as possible. :slight_smile:

5

In terms of what to ask for them, I would first try to find out what Oak Hill sells their plots for and then (assuming you find a buyer) offer yours for something between that and the $350 that you said changing ownership costs.

In terms of “how to get the word out,” you might contact pastors in the area and let them know that you have these plots and are willing to make them available. At some point, some pastor is going to know of some poor soul who has passed on and the family is cash strapped…the church might even be willing to cover the transfer fees for one of its less fortunate parishioners. If it is a very sad story, the cemetery might even be willing to forego the transfer fee in the case of a donated gravesite… Assuming they aren’t hearltess.

The same with contacting social workers at local hospitals; at some point someone will know of a family that needs (or will need) a grave plot or two but does not have a lot of money.

Or, you could just consider it the ultimate sunk cost and walk away from it. That $350 transfer fee seems a steep hill to climb, and frankly seems to be a bit of a money grab by the cemetery.

6

wellanuff, thank you for those ideas - I’ll get cracking on that next week!! You’ve given me some great ideas to start. :slight_smile:

I appreciate it!!!

7

Cemetary plots strike me as the ultimate time share - pitch often includes a hard sell, maintenance done by the owners association, great if it’s a place you like and will use, not much resale value if you need to unload it.

Good luck Missy2U, I hope you find a way to get value out of the plots!

8

So the plot of your post is you don’t want the plots? You want to plot down for eternity somewhere else?

9

Conflict of interest? Please. Has it been a few days? Have someone else call and ask for a quote. They’re not in the market currently, but they’re starting to do some financial planning and would like a nice ballpark figure.

Your method of finding an average is one workable solution. Another is looking at ads and trying to find as good an equivalent as you can and use that figure (assuming it sold at that figure - not necessarily true). A third way is to find the average, look at the range, and then squint sideways and try to see how the prices seem to spread. If your plots are in a nicer or better located cemetary, nudge the price up toward the higher end.

  1. I’ve never sold a plot, but my parents did.

  2. It was in the 1990s, with a newspaper’s classified ad.

  3. The newspaper ads were how they learned what to charge.

  4. I’ve never donated a plot and I’ve only heard of people supplying them to relatives.

It sounds like you’re not emotionally invested in wringing every last dollar possible out of the sale, which simplifies things. Because if you just want it to be over, to the point of considering donation, all you have to do is advertise it at the average you have or make it a little lower if you want it to sell fast. If that’s lower than what you could have sold it for, you’ve given someone a break.

Are you sure that an ad in a big paper would really be that expensive? Usually, for classified ads, the cost depends on the type of item and its sale price. I can’t imagine a paper wanting to overprice cemetary plot ads.

Good luck. Mom & Dad’s plots sold quickly.

10

The big question, in my mind: Are the plots adjacent to each other?

You say they are next to your grandparents’ graves - is there an enclosed section that is ONLY your family?

If at all possible, get photos of the plots and ESPECIALLY the view from said plots - in a gully, facing a crematorium would be a tougher sell tan on a gentle slope overlooking a river.

11

I’d strongly consider advertising at assisted living communities and nursing homes near the cemetery. Those are concentrated groups of people who will be thinking about planning for that sort of need. Possibly also local attorneys who do wills and estate planning.

A more difficult tactic would be to figure out who gets buried in that cemetery. Is it people from the neighborhood? Certain churches? Who used certain funeral homes? And advertise at those places. This would take some research (googling for obits that list that cemetery).

My grandparents bought their cemetery plots second-hand from a private holder. They wanted to be buried in the graveyard associated with the church my grandmother attended. But, in that case, the church cemetery had no unpurchased plots left to sell themselves, and the town is a resort town where real estate is at a premium, so they were in demand.

Just FYI: if you are not interested in using them because you plan to be cremated, you could still used the plots for interring your cremains. My grandparents had to buy 3 plots in order to get into that cemetery I mentioned, and when my sister died unexpectedly, we used the third to inter her cremains. It was relatively inexpensive. I know a lot of people don’t want burial because they don’t want the expensive ritual of embalming and a casket. Those things aren’t necessary to use a cemetery plot. Just in case that changes your mind.