The Headstone Costs Nearly Twice the Cremation. Then the Lease Runs Out.

Cremation is now the cheap part of dying

At Going Rate's prices, a headstone with its inscription ($5,000) costs nearly twice a direct cremation ($2,650), which covers the transfer, the paperwork and the crematorium fee with no service. A memorial plaque ($1,950) on its own costs about three quarters of that cremation. The comparison holds only against a no-service cremation. A full funeral service ($9,500) costs nearly twice the headstone.

Most Australian families now cremate. The ABS says 188,421 deaths were registered in 2025. In NSW, Cemeteries and Crematoria NSW counted 46,722 cremations and 18,087 burials in 2024-25, a cremation rate of 72.1%. The rate was 68.9% in Metropolitan Sydney and 75.0% in rural and regional NSW. Private operators carried out 37,358 of those cremations, or 80%.

No current national cremation rate exists. The Cremation Society's international table, citing the Australasian Cemeteries and Crematoria Association, gives Australia 69.23% for 2009 and says the 2009 figures are the latest obtainable. The NSW counts are the most recent measured figures for any state.

The cemeteries' own price lists say the same thing

Cemetery operators price cremations and memorials themselves. Southern Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust (SMCT) in Melbourne charges $1,210 including GST for an adult weekday cremation without a chapel in 2026-27. On its Springvale Botanical Cemetery list, a standard 380 by 280mm bronze plaque costs $1,305, a token wall plaque $1,380 and a deluxe design plaque $3,040. The standard plaque costs $95 more than the cremation.

The ACT's 2026 fees determination charges $1,006 for a permit to erect a full monument and $1,252 for a delivery-only adult cremation at Gungahlin. The permit, which buys no stone, costs 80% of the cremation. A permit for a family estate or monumental lawn memorial costs $631. Perth's Metropolitan Cemeteries Board charges $1,422 for an adult cremation, including 60 minutes in a chapel or lounge, and lists memorials from $716 including the plaque. Brisbane City Council charges $755 for an adult cremation and does not publish its plaque or headstone permit fees online.

These are crematorium fees only, smaller than a direct-cremation package. At Going Rate's prices, a headstone ($5,000) costs about 4.1 times SMCT's cremation fee, 3.5 times Perth's and 6.6 times Brisbane's.

The permit is the cemetery's cut before a stone goes up

In Victoria, a cemetery trust must approve every new memorial, and it charges a permit fee to do so. Victoria's Department of Health recommends a 2026-27 permit fee of $175 for a new headstone on an existing foundation, $200 without one, $210 for a monument on a foundation and $245 without. An extra inscription adds $100 and weekend installation access $145. Trusts can charge more if the department approves a fee justification. San Remo Cemetery, run by SMCT, has a gazetted headstone permit of $435, about 2.5 times the recommended $175, and charges $325 to affix an externally supplied plaque.

Installation and lettering come on top. SMCT charges $200 to install, move or remove a plaque or granite panel, and its Springvale list prices headstone installation at $490 and inscription at $10 a letter for granite headstones in the Jewish denominational graves. At Rookwood's Granite Lawns in Sydney, where families share a headstone, Metropolitan Memorial Parks charges $480 for gold lettering up to 60 characters, $550 for a ceramic photo, $675 for a six-line bronze plaque, $560 to re-face a headstone and $10.90 for each standard letter after the first 60.

Under the ACT determination, a family that surrenders its grave gets the memorial permit fee back only if no monument has been installed. Once the stone is up, the refund is zero. Going Rate's price for a headstone ($5,000) includes the inscription but leaves out these permit and installation charges.

The headstone comes later, and so does the bill

Brisbane City Council says a headstone can go on a grave 6 to 12 months after the burial, depending on the style, and a plaque can take up to 12 weeks. In Perth, the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board allows a temporary marker for 24 months after a burial. Some grounds rule out headstones altogether. Pinnaroo Valley Memorial Park does not allow monuments, so graves there are marked with lay-flat bronze plaques, and a plaque ($1,950) costs about two fifths of a headstone ($5,000) at Going Rate's prices.

The delay keeps the memorial off the funeral quote. NSW rules in force since 1 February 2020 make funeral providers list the price of each good and service and display their cheapest package, CHOICE reports. Those rules cover funeral providers, and a headstone usually comes from a monumental mason months after the funeral. The NSW Government's pricing fact sheet lists memorialisation as a separate third cost after the interment right and the burial fee, with separate charges for processing a memorial application and installing the memorial.

The fee rules reviewed for this report, in Victoria and the ACT, set what cemeteries charge. Victoria's Department of Health guidance for masons covers construction standards. A family buying a stone a year after the funeral compares mason quotes without a funeral director's itemised price list beside them.

A stone built for 50 years, on a grave leased for 25

Perth's Metropolitan Cemeteries Board sells a Grant of Right of Burial for 25 years, at $2,748 for a monumental grave and $2,862 for a lawn grave in 2026-27. Renewing for another 25 years costs the same again. The Board says it does not send reminder letters about a grant's expiry, and on expiry control of the grave reverts to the Board. At Going Rate's prices, a headstone ($5,000) costs about 1.8 times the monumental grant it stands on, and about a third of a burial plot with interment ($14,500).

Masons build to a longer clock. Victoria's Department of Health suggests masons follow the Australian standard for headstones and cemetery monuments, AS 4204, which aims for a minimum service life of 50 years. NSW has offered renewable rights since 2018, with a minimum 25-year term for a burial, six months after expiry to renew, reuse of the site two years after expiry and removed memorials kept for five years. Few families took them up. IPART found 72 renewable-tenure interments out of 17,955 in NSW in 2018-19, or 0.4%.

In Adelaide, the Adelaide Cemeteries Authority says Enfield Memorial Park has only two years of capacity left in its General sections, and most graves in the older lawn areas it may reuse have been expired for more than 15 years. Families can apply to reclaim the monument. Victoria keeps graves perpetual, but 25-year rights for ashes places such as niche walls and rose gardens can lapse, and the trust may then remove the memorial. Stakeholders told IPART that monuments become the de facto responsibility of the cemetery operator when the rights holder cannot be located, and Smithfield Cemetery told IPART that families are unlikely to maintain monuments more than 50 years down the track.

Where the ashes go, and what that costs

NSW recorded 13,156 ash interments in 2024-25 against 46,722 cremations, Cemeteries and Crematoria NSW says. By our calculation that equals 28% of the year's cremations. Interments can come years after a cremation, so the figure is a rough guide, but it suggests most cremated remains in NSW did not go into a cemetery that year.

For families who do place ashes, the official prices vary widely. At Springvale, SMCT charges $2,025 for a single partial wall niche holding a portion of the ashes, $6,435 for a single granite wall niche, $14,465 for an individual rose in a rose bed and $585 to inter ashes in an existing grave. SMCT notes that its right of interment does not include memorials or plaques unless stated. The rose bed costs nearly 12 times SMCT's own cremation fee.

At Pinnaroo, Perth's Metropolitan Cemeteries Board lists a standard ground niche at $2,243, a premium reflection wall at $3,147 with a small plaque or $6,680 with a large one, a memorial garden bronze plaque at $1,075 and a bronze leaf at $716. The ACT charges $774 to inter ashes behind a plaque in a wall of remembrance. Several of these cost less than a standalone memorial plaque ($1,950) at Going Rate's prices, and the ACT's $774 fee is less than a third of a direct cremation ($2,650).

Headstone, plaque, niche or nothing

At Going Rate's prices, a headstone ($5,000) costs about two and a half times a plaque ($1,950), and slightly more than a coffin or casket ($4,400). Cemetery permit, installation and interment fees come on top of both memorials.

Before ordering a stone, ask the cemetery for the permit and installation fees in writing. Ask whether the section allows monuments at all, since Pinnaroo does not. Check how long the right of burial or ashes placement lasts and who will be told when it ends, because in Perth nobody is. At SMCT, ask whether the right of interment includes the plaque, since it does not unless stated.

Common questions