GOODWILL

Many of the former owners and staff of our acquired funeral homes and certain cemeteries have provided high quality service to families for generations, which often represents a substantial portion of the value of a business. The excess of the purchase price over the fair value of identifiable net assets of funeral home businesses acquired is recorded as goodwill. Goodwill has primarily been recorded in connection with the acquisition of funeral home businesses.

See Note 1 to the Consolidated Financial Statements included herein, for a discussion of the methodology used for our annual goodwill impairment test.

The following table presents changes in goodwill in the accompanying Consolidated Balance Sheet for the year ended December 31, 2018 and period ended September 30, 2019 (in thousands):



	December 31, 2018			September 30, 2019
Goodwill at the beginning of the period	$	287,956		$	303,887
Increase in goodwill related to acquisitions	16,777			—
Decrease in goodwill related to divestitures	—			(4,197		)
Decrease in goodwill related to impairments	(846		)	(509		)
Goodwill at the end of the period	$	303,887		$	299,181

During the three months ended September 30, 2019, we sold a funeral home business with a $4.2 million carrying value of goodwill for a loss recorded in Other, net. See Note 4 to the Consolidated Financial Statements included herein, for a discussion of our divested businesses.

We also recorded a goodwill impairment of $0.5 million in Other, net, related to a funeral home business (at a leased facility) that we intend to cease operating in the fourth quarter of 2019.