Money spent on wedding

[samantha1979]

I will try and get some pics up here this week. Everyone seems to be curious about the wedding. They seem to like the idea, but most people are afraid to do it themselves!! My husband and I like to do things a little different sometimes. You know, I have never seen him in a suit or tux? Guess I missed my chance!! He always told me he would never wear a tux. He wasn't lying!

 

[lionessrampant]

Erm...ours will end up costing about $23,000 after the honeymoon, various parties and dinners and showers, tax, title, registration....but we ARE having it in downtown Chicago, so this is actually an absolute BARGAIN and I know many couple who spend between $40-50K EASILY doing a similar wedding to what we are. We had toyed with eloping, but my family would simply never approve of that, and since they're footing the reception bill anyway....

I'd be ok with getting married on an island somewhere. But, I'm not going to argue with a big old-fashioned one either.

 

[calico2222]

Originally Posted by lionessrampant

Erm...ours will end up costing about $23,000 after the honeymoon, various parties and dinners and showers, tax, title, registration....but we ARE having it in downtown Chicago, so this is actually an absolute BARGAIN and I know many couple who spend between $40-50K EASILY doing a similar wedding to what we are. We had toyed with eloping, but my family would simply never approve of that, and since they're footing the reception bill anyway....

I'd be ok with getting married on an island somewhere. But, I'm not going to argue with a big old-fashioned one either.

Getting married in a major city makes a BIG difference! We had our reception (buffet) at a Holiday Inn. We live in a smaller town, but just for fun we asked what it would cost in Baltimore. Where I live, it cost $15.95/person. In Baltimore, for the same menu it would cost $69.95/person! Not to mention the renting of the room or the bar bill. I think a lot of it has to do with where you live. We actually had a pretty extravegant wedding for our area. If I lived in a big city, we would have gone the JOP

 

[jellybella]

Originally Posted by lookingglass

Less than a thousand. That includes the rings.

We eloped because we thought we could use the money for something better. I also didn't have the little girl fantasy of a big white wedding.

same here. We spent the most on the rings because we wanted platinum, but we spent about $300 on everything else (license, fee, tip for the mayor). My mom bought me some flowers and I got my dress on the clearance rack at Macy's. After 6 years together, this was kind of a formality

 

[lionessrampant]

Originally Posted by calico2222

Where I live, it cost $15.95/person. In Baltimore, for the same menu it would cost $69.95/person!

:spits out water all over the place: What?! $70 a person?!

We're paying like $125 a person, in a city where $190 a person is CHEAP! It doesn't help that my parents live in a "desirable" suburb, so there's no escaping the costs. Ahhh!

 

[lunasmom]

Originally Posted by lionessrampant

:spits out water all over the place: What?! $70 a person?!

We're paying like $125 a person, in a city where $190 a person is CHEAP! It doesn't help that my parents live in a "desirable" suburb, so there's no escaping the costs. Ahhh!

There was an article, I think on MSN.com that compared wedding costs between the East Coast and MidWest. I was surprised to read that the East coast prices were a lot less then the MidWest. I wish I could find the article now.

Anyhoo it said that the average for food was a lot higher per person in the Midwest...including cake prices.

 

[lookingglass]

This post is for all the brides to be out there. People will simply charge you MORE because you say it's a wedding. For instance, a limo service in our area charges $150.00 a day to use their service for Prom. For a wedding it's $250.00!

The best thing to do is find out about this and call out your vendors on over charging you. You'll see a price drop if you fuss a bit about it.

 

[natalie_ca]

I used to work with a girl who was spoiled rotten...literally.

She was an only child and she was indulged at home like you wouldn't believe.

She was became a registered nurse at age 20 and continuted to live at home with her parents. She worked full time and she didn't pay rent. Her parents also bought her brand new car for her and even paid for the gas and the insurance. Plus they gave her a credit card which they also paid. Told you... spoiled rotten. Anything she wanted, they gave her. She was banking 100% of her pay cheque because she had zero expenses.

She had gotten engaged and her parents were paying for an elaborate wedding for her too. There was going to be "Presentation". I remember one evening at work she was talking about the dinner and apparently the meal was costing about $65.00 per plate. She actually had the nerve to say out loud "If you are the type to put $25.00 in an envelope, don't bother because the meal is costing $65.00"

I wasn't invited to the wedding, and given her attitude I wouldn't have gone even if I had been invited.

As someone said, the important thing is saying the vows to your partner, there is really no need to go to all of that expense to have a party afterward. Too many people means that the bride and groom really don't have much time to spend with their friends and family and a formal affair really ends of being very "impersonal" because to be honest the day is so overwhelming for them that they don't really "see" you, all they see is a blurr of people.

I think it's better to keep it smaller and have fun and be able to actually interact with the bride and groom. That way the bride and groom actually have memories beyond a large crowd of people in a hall.

 

[catsrnmom]

For my wedding way back when, my parents didn't help out because we all (5 girls) had the choice of them paying for our wedding or our college education, not both. So I got my education paid for and my ex and I paid for our wedding, and we tried to stay within a strict budget...It pays to "shop" around for better prices when it comes to the dress, reception etc. I think we spent a total of $2200.00 for everything and we had a very large wedding. I bought a dress that I loved from the last year models for $300.00 and my veil cost about the same. The rental hall was all inclusive and included the meal, decorations, cake and DJ. We had about 200 guests. We waited until the last 4 days prior to the wedding to book our honeymoon and got in on a cancelation to Cancun, Mexico all inclusive(even air fare) for the 2of us for $500.00...So there are ways you can save alot of $$ for a wedding.

 

[mooficat]

We spent 2 k pounds on our wedding, including a four week honeymoon in Corfu - there was a special offer on, a bit like buy one get one free, so we got four weeks for the price of two, this was in the days when you went into a travel agents to book your holiday

My niece got married 3 yrs ago and spent 16 K

it was lovely and a beautiful day, but of course you can never see where all that money goes !

Was it different to mine, yeah, sure it was, she had a posh dress, church wedding, I had a registry one, a limo, we used our own cars

fancy stationery & balloons at the reception, video and camera man to capture the days events, my brother took all the photos and presented me with the finished album as a gift, 3 bridesmaids, 8 groomsmen

I didn't want or need any, evening bash with resident DJ, we zipped off to London for the night before we flew out to Corfu, she bought a ton of gifts for all the groomsmen, bridesmaids, mum, MIL etc...etc.....

At the end of the day, it is what you want to do, but I certainly think its way to easy to get sucked into the 'must have this' syndrome.

 

[littleraven7726]

Originally Posted by Natalie_ca

She actually had the nerve to say out loud "If you are the type to put $25.00 in an envelope, don't bother because the meal is costing $65.00"

OMG! that is unbelievably rude!

after we eloped, a few months, we went home to wisconsin and our families threw us a reception at a restaurant. that was much more fun than any formal gathering. my mom bought a sheet cake and had our wedding photo made into frosting on the cake. it was pretty cool.

i must say, we were surprised we got wedding presents since we eloped. we certainly didn't expect any, and were grateful for anything we got.

we don't regret eloping. the more weddings we go to, the happier we are we eloped. there were also a lot of tensions/fighting with my family because we lived together for over 2 yrs before marriage.

6+ yrs of marriage later we are still going strong.

 

[natalie_ca]

Originally Posted by littleraven7726

OMG! that is unbelievably rude!

Yep, she is incredibly rude, and crass about it too. She no longer works at the hospital I work at, and I can't say that anyone misses her. She really was a piece of work that one, LOL

 

[lunasmom]

Originally Posted by Natalie_ca

She actually had the nerve to say out loud "If you are the type to put $25.00 in an envelope, don't bother because the meal is costing $65.00"

You know that doesn't surprise me. I hate being invited to weddings where I barely know the person or it's a family member that I haven't seen or talked to since I was younger (I'm talking 18 or younger). Most of those people are in it for one thing: money or gifts.

Heck, last summer I was invited to a wedding by a coworker. We occassionally talked to each other, but maybe 5 times over the course of 6 mos. I didn't even bother sending a gift, just because I felt I was invited more for the gift rather than for the occassion.