What a funeral costs in Nigeria, and how families abroad pay for it

The pieces

• Mortuary: N3,000 to N10,000 a day at a public mortuary and N15,000 to N50,000 a day at a private funeral home, plus a deposit and a release fee. A four to eight week stay ran N200,000 to N800,000 in 2026.
• Embalming: about N75,000 in 2023; N100,000 to N300,000 by 2026 estimates.
• Casket: local wood from about N100,000 to N150,000; imported wood or steel from N250,000 up to several million.
• Hearse: N100,000 to N500,000. Pallbearers and a brass band each about N150,000 a day (2022).
• Burial plot in Lagos: Atan public cemetery N300,000 for a single plot (2023); Vaults and Gardens, Ikoyi from about N3.2 million; Ebony Vaults from N12.5 million. Private cemeteries generally N350,000 to N10 million.
• The gathering: hall N200,000 to N2 million or more; catering N1 to N5 million for 200 to 500 guests; aso ebi fabric N200,000 to N1 million; printed programmes N100,000 to N500,000; a newspaper obituary N500,000 to N2 million.
• In the South-East, a cow is expected; one cost more than N500,000 in 2024.

Why the body waits

Bodies are commonly kept in a mortuary for weeks in the South-West and for three to six months in the South-East, sometimes far longer, while relatives travel home from abroad, money is raised, and in some communities a house is finished before the burial. Churches often insist on burial within a month. Anambra State has since 2019 capped mortuary stays at two months and burial ceremonies at one day, with fines, and reaffirmed the law in 2026. An academic study of Nigerian burial costs concluded that many families are poorer after the funeral than before.

Bringing someone home from the UK

• UK repatriation specialists quote from about £1,300 to £1,700 plus the flight, or from about £3,900 all in, to Lagos. Most take 5 to 14 days from first contact to departure.
• Paperwork: the UK death certificate, an embalming certificate, a freedom-from-infection certificate, and a burial transit permit from the Nigerian High Commission in London. The High Commission appointment is the usual cause of delay.
• For comparison, a simple attended funeral in the UK cost £3,828 in 2026, and 15% of UK families needed to find an extra £2,365 on average to pay for one.

How families abroad pay

• The WhatsApp committee. Research in Ebonyi State found online "committee of friends" groups have become the main way funerals are funded, with levies per member and a running total.
• Church and town-union levies, dues owed before a burial, and the expected contributions in kind.
• Public appeals. GoFundMe pages to bring a parent home from the UK or US typically target £10,000; the ones we looked at had raised £1,500 to £8,000 at the time of reporting.
• One person, usually abroad, underwriting the difference.

What this page is for

Kinship's plans today are about health and care for someone living. We publish this because the same families ask us what happens at the other end, and because the numbers are hard to find in one place. If it would help to plan ahead, talk to us; we will say plainly what we can and cannot do.

Related

• What happens to a Kinship Plan when someone dies
• Sending money to Nigeria for healthcare