You can begin with the bills your family has received and the income you will no longer have. There is more to the calculation, though. Someone may have provided care at home without being paid for it, and the family may also have a claim for losing their companionship. Damages means the compensation sought for these losses. What you can include depends on state law, your relationship to the person and the evidence available.
Start With the Financial Losses
For an expense you’ve already paid, you may have a receipt. Future support takes more work because you need to establish what would have continued and for how long.
- Gather the bills first. Include funeral expenses and treatment before the death. Write down who paid each bill, even if someone outside the immediate family helped. The attorney needs to determine who can claim that expense and whether it belongs in a family member’s claim or an estate claim. It should only be counted once.
- Look at the income the family depended on. Part of the person’s salary would have paid for their own living expenses. Subtracting that part helps establish how much would have been available to others. Employment benefits may also have value; check whether you’ve already included them. Then consider how long the person was likely to keep working and how their earnings might have changed.
- Include the work done at home. If they cared for children, find out what replacing those hours would cost. Someone who had retired or wasn’t earning a salary could still have provided care the family now needs to pay for. The hours may change as children grow older, so the same yearly amount may not apply throughout.
- Review the future amounts. Receiving money today is different from receiving it over the next ten years. Money paid now can earn a return before it is needed. The adjustment for that is called present value. A financial expert may need to examine the projection, including whether you’ve counted any support, benefits or household work twice.
Here is a hypothetical example. All amounts are assumptions for illustration:
| Item | Assumption | Amount used |
|---|---|---|
| Funeral and burial | Eligible, documented expenses | $20,000 |
| Future support | $30,000 annually for 10 years; assumed present value of $250,000 | $250,000 |
| Household services | Separately assumed present value; no overlap with support | $40,000 |
| Illustrative subtotal | Personal losses assessed separately | $310,000 |
You may notice that ten years at $30,000 adds up to $300,000, while the table uses $250,000. That lower figure assumes payment now, before those years have passed. We haven’t worked out a discount rate here. The $250,000 would need financial analysis in an actual case. Adding the three entries gives $310,000 in economic losses for this example; it doesn’t tell you what a settlement would pay.
How Personal Losses Are Valued
There is no standard amount to add for losing a parent or spouse. An attorney may ask about the relationship and what the person did in your life. You can explain that in your own words. How often did you see each other? What did you turn to them for? A parent living elsewhere may still have been involved in decisions about school or work. Living at a different address wouldn’t explain the extent of that guidance.
Family testimony and other evidence help establish these losses, subject to what the relative can recover under state law. Companionship, guidance and mental anguish are often described as non-economic losses. Multiplying the bills by a fixed number doesn’t establish their value.
Your family’s losses are also separate from suffering the person experienced before dying. Whether that earlier suffering can be included in another claim needs its own legal review.
How State Law Changes the Calculation
Across the U.S.
Find out whose losses an estimate covers before relying on the total. The person filing may act for several relatives and the estate, but that doesn’t mean each has the same claim. Who can recover, what can be claimed and any restrictions depend on the state.
Florida
A spouse, child and parent can have different rights under Florida’s damages statute. A loss available to one relative may not be available to another. There are also limits on some personal-loss damages for certain children and parents in medical-negligence cases. The estate’s losses need to be considered separately, and future support and services must be reduced to present value.
If your relative lived for a time after the injury, you may wonder about compensation for what they went through. Under section 768.20, the ordinary personal-injury action doesn’t survive when that injury causes death. You shouldn’t automatically add a separate claim for their pain before death.
Ohio
Ohio’s law allows qualifying claims for support, services, companionship and related personal support, expected inheritance, mental anguish, and reasonable funeral and burial expenses. Expected inheritance concerns assets the person would have accumulated and left behind. Money counted as support spent on the family can’t also be treated as savings they would have inherited.
The personal representative, authorized to act for the estate, brings the action for the beneficiaries. Establishing that authority is part of filing a wrongful death claim. Ohio also allows personal-injury actions to survive death, so losses belonging to that separate claim need to be reviewed too.
Why the Settlement May Be Different
An insurer might agree with the income figures and still dispute whether its policyholder caused the death. More pay records wouldn’t resolve that disagreement. Evidence about what happened is among the factors affecting a wrongful death claim. Applicable fault rules, insurance coverage and whether payment can be collected also affect the result.
If you have an offer, ask what each person would receive from it. Legal fees, case expenses and valid liens or reimbursement obligations can affect the amount left. The way it is divided matters as well. Ohio’s distribution process involves court supervision; you shouldn’t assume everyone receives an equal share.
A wrongful death settlement calculator or average payout won’t answer those questions. Podor Law can review the circumstances with you before you rely on an estimate or accept an offer.
Gather the Records That Support Your Estimate
Bring what you have so far:
- Pay records, tax returns and benefit statements.
- Medical and funeral bills, including payment records.
- Notes about caregiving hours, household tasks and replacement costs.
- Family relationships, dependency information and estate papers.
- Incident reports, photographs and insurance correspondence.
If you’re waiting for a tax return, you can say that when you call. You don’t have to finish the calculation before asking for help. The financial records support the estimate, while the incident records help investigate responsibility. Your attorney may arrange for an expert to review future support once the necessary information is available.
Discuss Your Case With Podor Law
When you speak with Podor Law’s wrongful death attorneys, explain what you’ve been told so far and bring any offer you’ve received. We can discuss which losses need further investigation, what records are missing and whether a deadline needs attention. Those questions can be addressed while you’re still deciding whether to seek representation.
Families in Florida and Ohio can arrange a free consultation. For a case elsewhere, speak with an attorney licensed in that jurisdiction.
