...to cancel our big wedding and ask to use the money for a house deposit?

[stumblymonkey]

DP and I are planning to get married on 1st December. We have been very excited and are well ahead with the planning, deposits have been paid to pretty much all the suppliers. The only things we haven't bought yet are the dress and groom's party suits.

We have paid roughly £5k in deposits. The whole wedding will cost c.£30k and we are very lucky in that our parents will jointly contribute £20k.

I've loved planning the wedding, it's everything I've ever wanted and we will/would have a perfect start.

DPs mum is very excited about the wedding. My parents think we should have had a small wedding and put the rest towards a house deposit (we are renting).

However....

I'm getting cold feet about the amount of money we're spending on one day that everyone says goes by in a flash and have started to think maybe we should lose the deposits and spend a small amount on a registry office or church wedding and then a meal at a pub or something informal.

Obviously it's our wedding and we can do what we like but AIBU to persuade DP to do this if he would prefer the big wedding?

And WIBU to ask DP's parents if they would still give us the money if we decided we wanted to use it as a deposit?

I'm more dithering between the two rather than dead set on a small wedding (I've been the one planning so far so can't say I haven't known about the costs as I have)...

I'm afraid I can't get past op's income and her assertion that it's not a lot in the Home Counties (erm, yes IT IS!) and that for some reason that she has been unable to explain she expects her family to gift her the money for a house deposit.

If that makes me rude or jealous, so be it.

No matter what type of wedding you have the outcome is the same. It's about you and your DP getting married not an expensive party. Lavish weddings do not make better marriages but stability and financial security can make life a whole lot easier.

My Dsis had a big expensive wedding about a year ago and although it was an amazing day I know she regrets spending that money.

I'm struggling to imagine wtf the venue is charging five and a half grand for, given that the fee covers none of the food, drink or venue styling.

OP, it sounds as though both sets of parents have set money aside specifically for this wedding - they seem to have an emotional investment in it as a big family event.

Perhaps it would be more diplomatic to say that you want to scale things back and see whether they want to reduce what they put in. An alternative is to use the 20k from parents for the wedding, accept that they will want a significant input, and save 10k as a house deposit.

Your guests will not even notice the flowers, let alone the odd bare table at the back of the room (which will be strewn with empty glasses within minutes).

Do you have any critical illness insurance in case you can't work?

Its just a bit of paper and a posh frock (married in a registery office 2 witnesses £200)knees up have a party byob and go on honeymoon put the rest to your house honestly lifes to short carpe diam

Random thoughts:
Is 200quids a month on gas and electricity normal? We spend 65 approx and we have a 4 bedroom house with 2 children...
Do ppl rly have wedding on week days and not week-ends?
Do people actually spend 1.5k on rings? And 2k on a dress? I don't have much knowledge of that, wedding was abroad (home for DH) and dealt with entirely by my parents and his parents. Did do a small civil wedding here for a few hundred quids which was fab :)
I also think 30k would be better spent on a house deposit but hey! Agree that DP should have a say of course but I will admit that I couldn't get myself to push for a fancy wedding myself if I earned little. But that's me. I expect my DH would feel exactly the same.

OP , whilst you are a high earner, l feel you are reckless to spend so much on a wedding when you have not got a home.
Businesses can fail, job markets can change, interest rates can go up, you could get ill/pregnant and earnings could drop.....Now is a great time to buy as rates are very very low and the market sluggish..(I live in Surrey)....so it is a buyers market. Your outgoings would drop hugely with a mortgage rather than renting.

If l were you l would save every penny and buy as fast as possible.Get rid of the debt asap and get some serious savings behind you.

We could afford an expensive wedding but chose a fab country house that was competitively priced but stunningly beautiful, and kept it to family and very close friends (60 people) amazing food and unlimited champagne, did the flowers myself from a London flower market, ex runway sample dress cost £450, local DJ....all in was around £7K and was the most fabulous day ever.

We had both got properties on less than 50% mortgages when we met having struggled on to the housing market very early, and had bought a flat together BEFORE we had our wedding, other properties were rented out for pensions. I have never earnt anything remotely close to 8k so have been very focussed on housing from a young age.

This is why l cannot comprehend your choice...sorry...however the vitriol here is totally uneccesary and is not MN at its best.

I do wish you both happiness however you decide to get married.

Oh and l would not ask inlaws for deposit cash under any circumstances. It would be very rude.

If I was you I would scale back the wedding a bit. You can still have a great day and have everything you want. Also, your living costs seem extravagant to me, why do you need a 3 bed detached house at the moment? We live in a nice bit of Surrey, 1 hour commute to London, in a 2 bed mid terrace - £920 a month (prob a bit cheap as estate agents not involved), £160 council tax, £100 gas and electric, £80 virgin, £40 car ins, £20 water, £500 food and drink, don't go out much as have a 2 year old and I'm not working. But you could save a shed load by living cheaper and afford a house quicker.

I haven't read the full thread, just the first two pages but 30K on one day that will go by so quickly, all I will say is I hope you have a videographer.

I'm a newly wed and my wedding was small but tasteful, still took a fair chunk out the savings but no where near that much!

I would definitely scale your wedding back if that's what you want to do. Your house is way more important than a party.
I don't think its common now for parents to contribute to weddings. My in laws offered to pay for our wedding, they are financially well off but we didn't feel comfortable with it and I'm so so glad we didn't.

But you cannot ask your in laws for money for your deposit for your house. That would be rude. I'm struggling to get past the fact you earn 8K a month and you are asking for their help.

"I earn circa £8k net per month so we're not rich"

Yes. Yes, you are. More per month than many people earn in a year. Around the top 11% of incomes in the UK. You are very wealthy; is your family minor nobility or something that you don't realise this?

Back to the question: It's not unreasonable to spend the other 25K on a house rather than a wedding, but I think it would be cheeky to ask parents to still give the money. They would most likely want the big family celebration, but if you don't then better to discuss it now.

£8,000 net per month is a higher income than top 11%.

This thread is reminding me of one I was on about a year ago with equally clueless posts about income/cost of living from someone who sounded similar to op.

8k a month is high-income, rather than rich. If her income stays like that for a long time, and she saves and successfully invests, then it is enough to make her rich in future, particularly if her husband-to-be starts contributing. At the moment, though, she isn't rich.

You're going to spend in one day what it takes my son, as a care worker, over 2 years to earn? And you earn more in 2 months than he earns in a year? Then you claim not to be rich, grow up and be sensible.

'Clip Clop' I reckon.

OP since your earnings are so good and you have family support I do not think your future will be much affected whatever you decide to do. I would still not spend that much on one day though. I have always thought how easy it would be to have flu or a tummy bug and the day be really compromised with money wasted on detail you can't really appreciate. I know that isn't the most likely outcome but the idea of concentrating all that money on one day, when so many things are out of your control....I would not like that at all. Maybe I am clueless as I have no plans to marry but I would go for cheap and cheerful every time.

Yes it is rude to ask them to spend their gift on something else. But your mom is cool with it, so her portion could go for the house deposit.

So a less expensive wedding is possible if your partner is ok with it. Less your moms portion. Or if you just want a much less expensive wedding, you don't take his parents money. if your partner agrees to this modest wedding.

He could casually mention that your mom preferred to give you all money for a deposit instead of a wedding, see what they say, but in no way ask. That is just rude and it's not like you couldn't pay for everything yourself pretty soon anyway.

Good luck!

I

I did just this, but actually before I got engaged. I wanted to buy an apartment when I started work and needed help with the deposit. I knew my dad had saved up for my wedding day I asked if I could have that money for the apartment instead. He gave it to me, I bought a place, later got married with a much simpler ceremony, and that flat was the sole reason we could then afford to buy a family home when we had children. That deposit money was by far the best 'thing' they could have given me to bless the wedding.

from. Sundance01 "... find out how they would feel about spending it differently - they may be fully in agreement!!!"

This is excellent advice. DH and I gave each of our two DS very substantial sums towards their weddings but we would have been delighted if they had said they preferred to use those funds as a chunk off their mortgages!

On the question of whether you can ask parents/parents-in-law if you could use the money on a house deposit instead: totally depends on the relationship you have with them. Clearly your parents are happy with that. Your PIL, from what your fiancé says, would probably not be.

I find it bizarre that parents would be happy to give £x for what is essentially a one-day party but refuse to give the same £x towards a house deposit instead... it's their right to do whatever they please, of course, but it does seem just a bit fucked up to me.

Sorry...£8k a month net? That's half my yearly gross salary OP you should be paying for your own wedding as well as the deposit on a house. It would be so bloody cheeky of you to ask your future in laws to repurpose their gift. Be gracious and accept their offer, don't bother asking them incase you come off as ungrateful in their eyes.

So you earn 8K a month, both families are well off and you're suddenly worrying about getting on the housing ladder?

Unless this is just an ego boost as we all tell you how rich you are you need some perspective.

You've said you can save for a deposit in the next few years - so do so. You said DP doesn't work - unless he's unable to work due to health why isn't he earning? You'd save quicker if he worked

If you want a house deposit quicker cut your outgoings

I imagine you'll get a ton of money as presents so designate that to the deposit fund
Enjoy your wedding

Reading this whilst there are people struggling to feed their families is making me feel quite sick.

Well yanno I haven't read the rules in a while but it's don't think reading it is compulsory

8k a month as a self employed contractor or similar is not the same as a net salary.

I think really this request would have to come from your DP but from what you've mentioned it doesn't sound like his parents would want to do that.

My parents actually told me that I could have a contribution towards a house or a wedding and were happy I took, what was in their eyes, the sensible option. I think if your dp's parents were going to be supportive of this approach they'd have brought it up already.

£5k a month after tax but if she had a lot of expenses eg might pay her own contractors £50k a year then perhaps she is talking about turnover rather than before tax profit.

However the fact some people earn more than others is not a problem. There will always be someone earning a lot more than all of us and a lot less. even Cuba never managed to achieve parity of all incomes even when it banned ownership of private property.