Are fewer people dying? Mortality trends, the boomer wave, and funeral home call volume

Owners heard the phrase “softer mortality” all through 2026, from earnings calls to state association meetings. It sounds like fewer people are dying. The federal data says something narrower: people are dying later, while the number of deaths stays high and is projected to grow. This guide, part of our funeral home market hub, separates those two ideas and shows how buyers use them when they price a firm.

Is the U.S. death rate really falling?

Yes. The age-adjusted death rate hit a record low in 2025. The number of deaths did not fall, though, and the number is what fills a funeral home’s calendar.

CDC’s provisional 2025 mortality report puts the age-adjusted rate at 689.2 per 100,000, down 4.6% from 722.1 in 2024. The same report counts 3,094,593 deaths, about 22,000 more than the 3,072,666 final count for 2024. Both statements are true at once because the population keeps getting older. Health gains lower the risk in each age group, but more people move into the oldest groups every year.

How have U.S. death counts moved since 2019?

They jumped during the pandemic, peaked in 2021, dropped sharply through 2023, and have been roughly flat since. The comparison base matters: measured against 2021, today looks like a slump; measured against 2019, it is growth.

Sources: NCHS “Mortality in the United States” data briefs for 2019 through 2023, and VSRR No. 44 for 2024 and 2025.

The 2021 peak is documented in NCHS’s Mortality in the United States, 2021, which reports 80,502 more deaths than in 2020. From that peak, deaths fell by about 373,000 over two years. A firm that hired staff or bought vehicles for 2021 volume felt that drop directly.

Note the 2019 rate of 715.2 sits above the 2025 rate, yet 2025 had about 240,000 more deaths. That gap is the aging population at work.

Why did funeral volume soften in 2026?

Public consolidators say mortality ran below their expectations for much of 2026. Whether that reflects a lasting trend or a normal swing will not be clear until final data arrives.

Carriage Services gave the most direct account. On its August 2026 call, summarized by Funeral Director Daily, CEO Carlos Quezada said mortality “softened across much of the country” beginning in January. Comparable funeral volume fell 3.5% in the second quarter and 4.7% for the first six months. He added that volume turned positive in July, while cautioning that one month “does not establish a long-term trend.”

SCI’s third-quarter 2026 earnings release shows a milder pattern. Comparable funeral services performed were 83,638 against 83,686 a year earlier, essentially flat, with core funeral homes down 0.5%. Even so, SCI’s full-year outlook reflects “lower funeral volumes than we originally anticipated.”

One reading, which we offer as interpretation rather than measured fact, is that the pandemic shortened the lives of many frail older people, leaving a smaller pool of very high-risk individuals in the years after. Another is ordinary variation in flu seasons and heat. Either way, the swings are measured in single-digit percentages, not the double-digit surge of 2020 and 2021. For a 150-call firm, a 4% national dip is about six families in a year, small enough that one harsh or mild winter could account for it.

How many deaths do projections expect over the next 25 years?

More every year, according to the Census Bureau. Its 2023 national projections show annual deaths climbing steadily as the baby boom generation reaches its 80s and 90s.

The figures come from Table 1 of the Census Bureau’s 2023 projections, rounded to the nearest thousand. Census years run July through June, and the series was built on a 2022 population base, so it does not match calendar CDC counts exactly. Actual 2025 deaths already ran above the projected figure. The same table shows deaths exceeding births starting in 2038 and leveling off near 4 million in the early 2050s.

Two cautions keep the projection honest. First, it is a forecast, and the record-low 2025 rate shows how quickly assumptions about longevity can move. Second, the growth is gradual, roughly 1.5% to 1.7% a year in the early 2030s. It lifts the whole market slowly; it does not rescue a firm that is losing ground.

How do deaths by age explain the paradox?

The oldest age groups are growing faster than their death rates are falling. That is why counts can rise while rates fall.

CDC’s 2025 provisional table makes the point by age. For people 75 to 84, the death rate fell from 4,264.0 to 4,087.4 per 100,000, but deaths rose from 822,944 to 853,780. For people 85 and older, the rate dropped from 13,834.0 to 12,787.5, while deaths still rose from 890,240 to 900,375. Every group under 65 recorded fewer deaths than in 2024.

For a funeral home, this means the family it serves is increasingly the family of someone in their late 80s or 90s. Those families are often smaller and more scattered, and many choose cremation. Geography adds another layer. A retirement destination gains older residents every year, while a farm county that lost its young people decades ago may already be past its peak in deaths. Our comparison of rural, suburban, and urban funeral homes explains how buyers read those local differences. Mix effects are a separate subject, covered in our guide to rising cremation rates and funeral home values.

How do buyers separate a market-wide dip from a firm-specific loss?

They line up the firm’s call trend against outside benchmarks for the same months. A decline that matches the benchmarks is the market. A decline worse than the benchmarks is the firm’s problem, and the firm’s price absorbs it.

Peer data from two public companies is a thin benchmark. Buyers also pull state and county counts from CDC WONDER, though county-level share math is its own discipline, explained in our guide to underwriting call volume. Timing matters too. A buyer comparing your 2026 first half with 2025 should use the same months nationally, because provisional CDC counts are revised upward as late records arrive.

What does the mortality picture mean for value?

It supports steady demand in the long run and does not change how any single firm is priced in the short run. Buyers value what your firm has proven, adjusted for where your market is heading.

In The Four-Number Funeral Home Valuation Screen, the first number is the three-year call-volume trend. National mortality is the backdrop for reading it. A flat firm in a flat national market reads as stable. A firm that grew while national deaths fell from their 2021 peak reads as a share gainer and earns the top of its range.

For sellers, three practical steps follow:

1. Show calls by year from 2019 forward, so the pandemic bump and its unwinding are visible rather than hidden.
2. Note any month-level softness in 2026 next to the public-company figures above.
3. Explain, in writing, any decline that runs ahead of those benchmarks.

Buyers’ expectations for 2027 volume and pricing are covered in our 2027 funeral home M&A outlook.