To not get paying thousands for a wedding?

Thing is so many people are saying it will never happen again. You don't know that. 50% of first marriages end in divorce now. 67% of second marriages and 73% of their marriages end in divorce. You're very likely to get divorced only a 50% chance you won't on a first marriage.

You have no idea how your marriage will go.

One of my friends spent hideous sums of money. Abroad hen do with multiple matching tshirts, swim wear, 2 sets of pajamas, all monogrammed with initials. The most expensive clubs on the island. Then a home hen do.

Then wedding 1 had to be small because of covid. Then she did wedding 2 so she could have the huge party she wanted the first time despite being already married. Then she went abroad and did wedding 3. All hideously expensive.

So her wedding celebrations were spread across 3 years with a wedding or hen do from 2019 to 2021

Fast forward to now and she's separated as her husband cheated and said he didn't love her anymore. She is also about to give birth so has gone from living it up at expensive weddings to being a divorced single mother. She isn't laughing any more at the debt incurred and hideous sums of money that were spent on weddings and hen parties now and all that money would have been better spent.

No one knows what will happen to them and I'm of the unpopular view that you should just get bloody married and focus on the marriage not the wedding. I've been to weddings and I don't care about the bow on the chair I'm sitting on or the bloody favours or sugared almonds it's just so wasteful.

I think its ridiculous to spend all that money on one day.

I really don't think most people are spending 6k on a Hen Do which is what your wedding cost is today by inflation (which doesn't take into account how the wedding industry has bumped up costs well above inflation).

5k twelve years ago and most of that went behind the bar!

I think we spent about £25k 21 years ago. It was central London for about 100-120. Well well worth it!
My father gave me £10k towards it, I am the first (and looks like only) one of three girls to get married. My husband paid the rest. I was 40, and know my parents spent years going to friends' children's wedding over the years, so I wanted it to be special for them too. Lots of their friends came from abroad (I live in England but grew up in America).
It was a truly lovely occasion, I timed it so no one was just hanging around waiting for something to happen. The food was excellent, the wine and beer flowed. We had a tribute band. A memorable event that I do not regret one penny - mind you we could afford it! It didn't require months or years of saving. We would have scaled down if so.

We spent a lot (£35k) but on the things that we wanted - good food, 12 foot long dessert table, subsidising guests rooms, paying for all costs incurred by the wedding party.

I also spent exactly what I wanted on the dress I wanted and chose beautiful blue satin Jimmy Choo shoes and matching bag with my inheritance from my DM who died 3 months before our wedding and taught me life is to short to not do what makes you happy.

But, there is no way I would've spent anywhere near that much if I couldn't afford it without getting into debt for it

I think it just depends on whether you want a "wedding" and what that looks like to you.

I think once you spend X on venue, X on food, drink, photographer, cake etc and it comes from thousands of pounds, you may as well just cough up and stop worrying about if its £5k, £10k, £15k, whatever and get the day right. No point spending that much and not feeling like it was perfect. As long as you can afford it.

@Fordian well your 5k wedding at today's prices would be just under 10k with inflation. so easy to see where extra costs come in so easily

Neither of our parents offered any help financially and we had no savings then so we eloped. Cheap as chips. Still good together 20 years on.

I would have liked to have a proper wedding though.

Annoyingly one parent paid for sil wedding few years later so gave DH some money (lesser amount) that would have been enough for a small reception.

My DS and DIL to be announced this evening that they've cancelled their plans for a big wedding and are going for a registry office ceremony and party at the local pub instead. I'm so happy, they were up to 15k already and that was without her dress, his suit etc. The thought of them spending all that money (and potentially getting in to debt for it) on a wedding was awful and I so nearly said something but glad I didn't have to.

I think mine cost about £8 million and I have no regrets, it was such a lovely day and...no...only joking, just joining in on the numbers game.

Mine was about £4k and that was abroad in Italy so we could easily control numbers/attendees, weather and got a really great holiday out of it too. Felt like a good way to do it.

I think my wedding cost no more than £1,000 all in. We wanted to be married, that's the important part.

Mine, 1998, was as cheap as chips. English church, local vicar (who required us to go on a 'preparation for marriage' course prior!); reception, after party. 40 guests in all. My dress was handmade, £250 (made in Australia, where we lived at the time). One maid of honour, shop bought dress, altered locally, one best man. Off the shelf suit like the groom, his brother.

No stupid stag/hen parties, as in, we both went out and got pissed with our mates, but not in Ibiza...

Vintage car, dad's mate. Flowers, mum's mate's daughter. Cake, my aunt. Photographer- family friend from across the road.

Reception local guitarist- who we never heard!

Then, essentially off to the pub with rooms, where we stayed, where all the singles sorted themselves out. My brother (chief usher) knocked on our wedding night door at 3am looking for contact lens solution.. 😂

But:
Nothing flash, nothing 'amazing'.

I honestly don't understand where the costs come in.

I still look back on that day, 25 years ago, with enormous fondness.

I think the whole shebang cost prob £5000.

I’ve been married twice. My friends all say I throw the best weddings which is nice. I don’t really regret spending a lot of money but I probably would if it had got me into debt

YANBU. I read somewhere that the more expensive the wedding, the greater the chance of divorce.

Not sure if it's strictly true but I do wonder what people need to prove. Surely marrying the love of your life is enough. You can have a nice day without breaking the bank.

Why can’t you say it in real life? everyone IRL knows exactly how I feel about weddings!

I always felt the same as you. In fact I didn't want to get married at all. I thought spending thousands on one day was ridiculous. But then when I had kids I did want to get married. And by that stage we had been together so long, the point was kind of to have a massive party to celebrate with friends and family. Having young children, we wanted somewhere we could stay and have entirely for private use. Which limited options and racked up the cost. But it was absolutely worth it. The majority of budget was venue and food. After that, we did a lot ourselves but still everything is very expensive. I can't actually remember how much we spent- I think somewhere around 15k. I wouldn't change anything. If we didn't have kids I might have done more myself. At one stage I was planning to make our wedding cake but quite late on had a 'WTF are you thinking!' moment and paid for one.

2k 27 years ago but 1k of that was on the honeymoon. 😂

Our wedding abroad (Rhodes, Greece) was about £25k all in, including the cost of flights and accommodation there for a week for me and DH, and a contribution towards the cost of flights for the lady doing my bridal and bridal party’s makeup, who is my beautician of many years (covering loss of earnings whilst she was away for this).

We only had 26 people there (immediate family and a couple of close friends) and they all made it their summer holiday. We paid for all wedding party outfits, hair and makeup. Chose a premium food and drink package and told everyone not to get us any gifts as they were already spending enough to be there. Everyone commented on what a fabulous time they had and it really was a great event.

We chose a destination wedding because it did work out a fair bit cheaper than what we would have spent on a country house hotel type wedding here, as there would inevitably have been a bigger guest list involving extended families, friends etc. Also, the weather was a big factor. I’d have been gutted to have spent a similar amount (or more) on a UK wedding only to have it pour down on the day and all of the pictures be grey and miserable. We have some absolutely stunning photos to look back on (ceremony was held on a veranda overlooking the sea, the sun was shining and the sky was blue with barely a cloud to be seen). 4 years later I still genuinely consider it the best day of my life.

I don’t regret anything I spent the money on but the one thing I would change if I could is to have my MIL and her husband able to be there. Sadly, she had not long had a stem cell transplant after relapsing from Hodgkins Lymphoma and could not get medical clearance to fly. It broke her heart and whilst BIL was able to FaceTime her so she could watch the ceremony, cake cutting, first dance etc ‘live’, it wasn’t the same.

Myself and DH have discussed having a vow renewal in the next few years, so we can get all dressed up in our wedding gear again and this time she can be part of it, as we’re conscious that, whilst she is now in remission, she isn’t a very well lady and we really don’t know how much longer we’ve got to make memories with her.

All that said, I have close friends (and a brother) who have had lovely weddings on a small budget >£5k. Ultimately, it comes down to what you and your partner want from the day and what you can afford. A factor will be how you plan to pay for it. All of ours was paid for from part of a redundancy payment I received, so it didn’t involve going into debt to afford it. Would I have been prepared to borrow/save for the wedding we had - absolutely. But I recognise not all people feel the same and there’s no judgement either way. The secret is not to forget that after the wedding comes the marriage and that’s the most important part of it!

My parents earn a six figure income. They insisted on paying for wedding. It cost 20k, and that was 15 years ago. It was a brilliant day and no regrets (from me, DH or my parents).

I personally think you pay what you/ family members can afford, and it's not worth getting into debt for, or foregoing a deposit on a house. For us 20k was affordable.

ours was about 30k I think but I wouldn't have changed a thing. it was perfect and everyone still talks about how good it was. Best money I've ever spent (we did make it a long weekend affair though rather than one day)

it's not just the getting married bit, it's having everyone I love together from all over the country, something which would never happen again. it was really the best day.

Our day last year was all about us too, and we only spent £800 I think everyone should spend exactly what they want to (as long as they're not getting themselves into debt) to have the day they dream of. We like good food so we took ourselves and 6 guests out for a lovely lunch, and that was perfect for us. My sister loves a huge party so spent 45k on her perfect day. Different strokes!