Wedding Cost

[garrardrj]

My daughter is getting married in 2019 around September . We will be paying for the day ourselves , the groom's side cannot afford to contribute. Anyone else had a situation like this ? Having had no involvement in my own wedding and the cost etc i was amazed at the cost of the venue hire ! Also the cost of catering for the wedding breakfast (Why is it called that?)
Anyway the reason for the post is what did your wedding cost and a brief outline of the type of location , ceremony , number of guests etc.......911 on hold again !

[GTIEagles]

Subscribed to this post with interest, as I will be looking at getting married in the next few years. We will probably go for something modest though!

[richtung]

We got married in 2014 so the experience is relatively recent.

Ours was a Chinese wedding so not comparable with your daughters (unless of course she is also having a Chinese wedding!).

You haven't asked specifically but one way to reduce costs is to have a wedding midweek. This seems to be more and more popular. Ours was on a Tuesday. We found the advantages to having a midweek wedding were:

1) More availability for venues, photographers etc etc
2) you can haggle (quite hard) on the price - most suppliers are twiddling their thumbs during the week which puts you in a decent bargaining position.

Hope this helps

Rich

[Juliand]

More of an observation, based on relative's events.......Flippin loadsamoney. An outdated, over-rated waste of money for one day, is my opinion.

My wife and I paid for our own wedding, getting a loan. My wife's parents weren't well off, and I didn't think it fair to expect my parents to foot the bill under those circumstances at the time.

Much better to give them £10k as a deposit for their house, or pay off a chunk of their mortgage, if they already have one.

Unromantic, moi? - just being rational in the face of the reality that it's mega-money for just one day...... Party pooper, ha ha

[rich83]

If she wants a big flash wedding then she needs to pay for it herself....   

At the end of the day you need to give them a budget. Anything over that then they can pay themselves. 

Or write them a blank cheque and get your pants pulled down.. up to you 




I think ours was probably about 10k.... 70 guests. To this day, many of our friends and family still claim it was the best wedding they had ever been to.... I think we went to bed at 4am.... 

[doylebros]

100% with rich above on this.

My pal got a bill of 43K because he didn't follow common sense rules (mother and daughter waned everything). Now after six months the daughter has filed for a divorce and he's got reduced savings crazy world.

[4ndy]

We got engaged 15 years ago got a mortgage then another. 2 massive sofas and a hound. Phuff getting married with all those vows and religious stuff. Girlfriend loves fancy hols I love fly fishing and my hound. daughter left uni with US in debt

[rich83]

You dont have to bring that load of nonsense religion into a wedding.... we didnt.

[colesey]

This is an interesting thread with some interesting replies. As parents, we all want the best for our kids but there also comes a time when they need to stand on their own two feet. I can’t help but feel that if you were to invite the bride and groom to cover their own costs that the ceremony would be more modest. You could always put the money you expected to spend towards a deposit on their first home and I suspect everyone would be better off

[RetroRaz]

I got married 5 years ago and it cost around 15-20k. That paid for 450 guests, venue hire, food, decor, bridal dress, my suits, and bedroom redecoration (probably missed out a few things which I can't remember)



Sent from my SM-G955F using Tapatalk

[Frodo-anni]

Got married 18/04/15. (I remembered  ) church wedding,hotel reception for 90, evening do 120 & 2 week holiday in Cyprus was approx 15k.

Location/venue can make a big difference, also time of year. 2 weeks after approaching may costs were circa 1.5k more. Also do you allow children or not, we didn't which saved £900 from the bill. We're West Yorkshire.

[garrardrj]

Good responses so far , thanks.
It will not be a religious wedding and will be at a civil ceremony venue.
Mid week weddings are the way forward imho , venues rarely booked up and as someone said all the others like photographers aren't either.
Just the venue for the day and 100 guest catering comes in at £8500.
£15k as the total cost i would be happy ...

[lukemk5gti]

My two cents:

My girlfriend and I had been saving for 5 years.

Her sister and boyfriend had been saving for 5 years.

We bought a great house at a good time, did the work ourselves and doubled our value with a short term mortgage and a chunk of money left in the bank.

They spent every cent they had on a wedding, have no savings and every bit of money is spent on their rent.

Expensive weddings are a waste of money for a single day, give them the money toward something that will last longer and have a small intimate gathering with immediate family only. They'll enjoy the day just as much and if in 20 years they always wanted a fancy affair then they can renew their vows and have that elaborate party they always planned.

[Bodyboarder81]

^ pretty much what he said ..... our wedding cost 2k and was absolutely amazing because of the people not the venue/dress/suits ect . Friends and family helped out , was a special day not just for us but the whole family who had a hand in it all .... after all that's what it's all about , family bonds .

We were helped out with our first deposit for our house with the money that could have been spent on a lavish wedding . 12 years later and one house move we are in a 450k place with a 80k mortgage.... all because of that initial guidance /choice

[Oggy172]

Our wedding all in cost around £11k.

That was flights to Malta for us, accommodation at a 4* hotel for 4 nights for 16 guests, a week for 8 guests (half board for everyone)

The wedding itself, the 5 course evening meal, evening entertainment, a Maserati for the day, a fabia for the rest of the week. Her dress, my suit, a 14 day honeymoon in Bali and spending money.