Wedding Wednesday: Making a budget for your big day
COVID has certainly made an impact on how much the average couple is spending on a wedding. According to The Knot, in 2019 the average wedding cost $28K which dropped dramatically to $19K in 2020. $19K is not pocket change and if you and your partner are paying for your big day on your own that might not be in your budget.
How much you choose to spend on your wedding primarily comes down to how much you are comfortable spending and what is important to you. Here are some tips and tools that will help you when it comes to making and sticking to a budget for your nuptials.
Before you plan anything have a real discussion about money with your partner: Sit down with your partner and talk about how much you each feel comfortable contributing to your wedding. That will look different for every couple. If you know that your families are going to be contributing to your big day you’ll want to include them in the conversation too, so that there are no misunderstandings about how much money you’re working with. You don’t want to drop $10K on a wedding dress only to find out that was the total amount your family was able to contribute later. You also need to have a conversation about how you will be paying for the wedding. When Lou and I started discussing the logistics of the big day the one thing I was adamant about was not going into debt for our big day. We are sticking to a smaller budget than we necessarily had to so that we can avoid having a credit card bill we’ll have to spend years paying off.
Know where you want to spend your money: Again this is a conversation for you and your partner to make sure both of your wants and needs are being met. For Lou, the most important thing was having all of our family and our closest friends there. That meant we had to narrow down our venues based on how many people they could accommodate and how much it would cost per person. I wanted to make sure that everyone who comes to celebrate with us had a good time. For me, that meant using more of our budget on food, alcohol, and entertainment. Flowers, an expensive wedding dress, videography, etc weren’t important to us so we’re spending less money there and omitting videography altogether.
Ask friends or family members (if they are comfortable) to share what they spent on their big days: Looking at another budget for a wedding you attended will give you a good idea of what you may be spending on your big day. Keep in mind there will be differences in cost based on your location and the type of wedding you are having.
Overestimate: I’d rather overbudget than underbudget. If I have an idea of the range of something I budget for the higher end. That way if we don’t spend the full amount there we’ll have some wiggle room to cover unexpected expenses that are sure to pop up.
DIY: Know your talents and the talents of any friends you are enlisting and DIY the things you are comfortable making. We are leaving the cake to the professionals, but Lou is an artist and I’m a home crafter so we saved a lot of money by designing our own Save the Date cards and we’re planning on creating our own centerpieces for the reception.
If you are still struggling with how to start a budget here are some resources that may help you:
