If adequate funds are not available to pay for a suitable funeral, then there is a variety of financial institutions that can assist you.

You should consider the differences between secured and unsecured loans, before you take out a personal loan.

Secured Loans

Some lenders will only offer personal loans that are secured. Secured loans typically use your house or other assets as security in case you default on your loan. This means your lender can sell the asset to pay off your loan.

Interest Rate Types

These loans are often only available as a fixed rate loan and the benefit is your repayment amounts don’t vary because the interest rate stays the same.

Fixed rate loans usually aren’t as flexible as variable rate loans though. You may not be able to make extra repayments without penalty, or have the convenience of a redraw facility. Make sure you check what you can and can’t do.

Loan Terms

A secured loan might also have a shorter loan term, making the repayment amount higher in order to pay it off in time.  A secured loan is a lower risk to the lender, so the interest rate might be lower than an unsecured one.

Unsecured Loans

Unsecured personal loans are mainly used for things like cars and debt consolidation, but can also be used for holidays, furniture and to pay for a funeral.

Unsecured personal loans don’t need security from you, but since it’s a higher-risk loan type for the lender, the interest rate may be slightly higher than for a secured loan.

Interest Rate Types

An unsecured loan can either be a fixed or variable rate. This means you can choose between having more flexibility with a variable interest rate, or the option of  more control over your budget with a fixed interest rate.

Comparing Loans

Personal Loans can be offered by all kinds of financial institutions, not just banks. Finance Companies, Credit Unions, Friendly Societies and Building Societies all offer secured and unsecured personal loans.

Unsecured personal loans, usually up to a limit of $14,999 may be made available to you, depending on your financial circumstances.

However, to pay for a funeral, some of these lenders will only offer a secured personal loan, so it is a good idea to compare the loan details from different lenders.

If you are experiencing difficulty accessing the required funds to pay for a funeral, please use our Business Directory Search facility to locate ‘Funeral Loan’ providers that can assist you with a personal loan.