How much should an engagement ring cost??

[Sounbelievablydull]

Humour me here please.
My original ring has disintegrated back has split and one ( v small diamond) has fallen out and is now lost.
Now I never thought I was a jewellery type person ...but... Now I find I'm noticing other people's rings and feeling envious.
So, if I were to put my original ring plus a few bits of trivial hideous 80s stuff together what would I need to come up with to have nice piece of bling???

Mine was 250pounds i love it its white gold with a solitaire diamond small but lovely

It could be everything or nothing, cost wise. There's a reason they're done in gold or platinum or palladium though. Those metals last; silver tarnishes and is squishy.

I've had two sets of platinum and diamonds - first lot cost £2000 ish altogether, second set about £7000. If I flogged them, they're done on mass, so a few hundred quid each..!

Mine is "less than £1000" and is platinum.

Doesn't platinum go quite dull?

99% of people who got married in the last 20 years seem to have gone for platinum or white gold but I'd imagine actual gold will come back into fashion at some stage.

Platinum shouldn't go dull. It's a naturally white metal. It will get marks on it but not dull. Obviously you need to still treat it with care and should really take them off when washing your hands and using chemicals.

White gold on the other hand will lose its white colour as its rhodium plated so will need re plating every now and then.

Platinum does become dull and develop a greyish patina over time. It loses its shine.

It can be polished and will be super shiny though in my experience it dulls again quite quickly.

Mine cost £400 and was fair trade sapphire. It was really unusual and my DP picked it himself for me so its very special to me despite not being as expensive as any of my friends rings. Its the fact he chose it that i love and ill always treasure it. The price doesnt matter it just matters that you love it. x

Mine was $13,000. There's not so much of a hype about it in England though. I would maybe spend £1500 depending on financial circumstances

You should spend what you can afford and are comfortable with

I would make sure the stone is decent quality if you want it to hold its worth but also you don't need to go for platinum - white gold is cheaper!

So my husband proposed with an old family ring - diamond solitaire but the diamond was very small - .25ct. I was a little disappointed at such a as mall diamond but tried not to let it show. We were at his friends house who is a jeweller and I saw on display a beautiful diamond ring however the diamond is about 2.5ct so pretty big. I admired it. My husband went and got it and gave it to me the day our first baby was born. I felt guilty that I had not been satisfied. I think he spent 10k but it's been valued at 40k. I do actually wear the big ring now mostly as I'm scared of leaving it at home and it being stolen!

My only requisite was that it wasn't to be a blood diamond, and the only way of making sure that it wasn't funding arms was to buy 2nd hand.

it doesn't matte what it costs - it's the sentiment.

if you are putting monetary value on those important aspects of a relationship then you seriously need to take a good long look at yourself and your priorities.

Just what clarrrp says. I don't think you can put a price on what is means.

Mine cost about £2000 as we bought the diamond and my my husband made the ring. For insurance purposes it's valued at a lot more. Definitely recommend buying the diamond and having a ring made up.

Well I heard it's 'supposed' to be 3 months salary but personally think that's bollocks and couldn't justify that. I don't have one. We did things through wrong way around really. I got an eternity ring first because dh was reluctant to marry (he was previously married so considered himself 'bitten'), then he proposed seemingly out of nowhere but we put all our spare money into the wedding so no engagement ring. He jokes that one day he'll buy me the engagement ring when I'm least expecting it. I'm not bothered tbh. We've been married for 7 years, together for 14, we have a 5yo ds and another on the way and are very happy together - that's all I need.

The three month salary thing was invented by De Beers. I think they also invented th Eternity ring.

Excellent marketing.

And someone said down thread that she was proposed to with a family ring and was disappointed by the size of the diamond so was given another one. That's the sort of thinking the 3 month salary thing leads to........

Yes that was me BertandRussell and I agree

My wedding and engagement rings together cost well under £1k and my wedding ring is platinum with diamonds in. No need to spend the earth.

What you can afford. It's the symbol that matters not the £££.

And just in case anyone's interested, this is where the idea of eternity rings came from. "The concept of the diamond eternity ring was created in the 1960s by diamond merchant De Beers.[3][4] American investigative journalist Edward Jay Epstein stated that at the time the company had a secret agreement with the Soviet Union which, in return for the creation of a "single channel" controlling the world's supply of diamonds, 'required' the purchase of 90-95% of the uncut gem diamonds produced by Russia.[4] The prevailing fashion at the time, particularly for engagement rings, was for them to be set with a single, large diamond. The Soviet gems, however, were small, often less than 0.25 Carats.[3] To avoid stockpiling, De Beers embarked on a campaign of promotion of jewelry containing a number of small diamonds culminating in the eternity ring, which was aimed at older, married women.[3] One campaign slogan, aimed at husbands, was "She married you for richer or poorer. Let her know how it’s going."[5] The idea proved popular with the public, and sales continue to be significant."

Never had an engagement ring
wedding ring was thin 9ct gold, cannot get it on my fat fingers anymore and I hate the feel of rings, I just cannot get used to them

Just got a replacement wedding ring to try, 2mm polished titanium £9, seriously! and it will last far longer than platinum or gold and it looks just the same

There's no "should" about it: depends on finances, personal taste, style etc.

I have a 2.7ct vintage ascher cut. I wear it everyday. Don't know what it cost and don't hold much store in the valuation. It represents far more than the cost

Bertrand, I swear I link to that, and to the original De Beers engagement ring campaign, every time this topic comes up, and people are still throwing around the 'shoulds' and it being a time-hallowed tradition - a virtual duty - that a man has to spend two/three/whatever month's salary. All I can say is that, while there's nothing obviously brilliant (to me) about either campaign, they're clearly incredible effective, and incredibly effective at covering their own tracks as campaigns aimed at making you spend money.

It still doesn't seem to be widely known that the diamond eternity ring was 'invented' as a way of flogging otherwise valueless small stones.