How much do you earn and how much did you spend on wedding?

[Rehne]

Joint income = £160k (but London)
Ages: 29 and 33
Wedding cost: £25k (5k from bride’s parents)
2023

Just curious. So many of the quotes we had were crazy. And obviously Dh and I doing okay financially. Who is spending all this money given the average income?

you are incredibly lucky, and I applaud you for helping others. but be very aware. life can change in a moment.

Coming up to 10 years married, joint income would have been approx 50k and the actual day was roughly 6500, honeymoon 7k.

We were given about 7k in total I think.

We had a hog roast for the wedding breakfast, my parents bought my dress, we got a discounted rate on photos from a family member, the cake was a wedding present made by one of DH family members, mil made table cloths and bunting and we did our own buffet in the evening. Day was amazing and I wouldn't have changed anything (well, I might have got a videographer for the ceremony...).

We already got our first mortgage before we got engaged and that's the way I would recommend anyone does it otherwise you run the risk of spending the house deposit on the wedding!

Household income at the time: £33K
Cost of wedding: £700

I have never heard that and if parents are spending life savings on a child’s wedding, I agree that is crazy.

for us it wasn’t either/or. A formal wedding was important to my parents. DH and I were 25 and happy to go along with it and it was a fabulous event with everything we could have dreamed of.

Sadly I’m not one of them!

Joint income - £150k

Wedding - £25k which was entirely funded by our parents.

Had they not wanted to spend that kind of money, there’s no way on Earth I would’ve spent that much. .

Joint income circa 100k.
Wedding 2023, abroad, 9 people in total, less than £5k including dress, suit, honeymoon and party when we came home. We used inherited rings. And we paid for it all ourselves. Bulk of cost was paperwork / legalities.
Best wedding ever too!

Married 2018

In the US, so using USD

My income is $300k
Husband's income is $180k

Wedding was ~$150k for 150 guests
Big caveat is that parents hosted our wedding

My parents had always planned to host and had therefore planned for this financially; they do not have a mortgage and are well set for retirement, and my husband and I had also already bought our first home. Had those factors been different, we certainly would not have been comfortable with the amount spent for just one day.

Married in 1998. I was skint; he was skint. Wedding cost £60. I still haven't got my money's worth!

We got married 10 years ago. We each earned about 70k. It cost about 20k, my parents paid about 6k, DH parents the same, DH and i paid the rest. Two thirds was venue & food. We had an 18 month long engagement & the costs were quite spread through it. The honeymoon was separate, DH and i paid for that and it was about £10k.

I’m with Kirsty Allsop in her assertion to buy the house first. Crazy if you spend loads on one day if you haven’t put the money into a home for the future. But after that who cares what you spend, so long as you’re comfortable with it and not getting into debt for it.

Wedding was about 16k back in 2014. My parents paid for most of it as that's the traditional thing and they had put money aside for it, so our joint salary doesn't matter.

Should have saved the money, the marriage lasted 3 years. I could have used the money for a house instead.

@AlanBrendaCelia me neither. It blows my mind that so many people on MN are paid so much. I shouldn't have opened this thread, I feel a bit shit now TBH.

39% of contributors to this thread had family income >£100k when they got married. A sizeable proportion had family income >£300k.

Earlier this year.
Joint income £140k
Wedding £60k
We haven't been on honeymoon yet but it will be a further £24k

Got married 2021. Joint income 95k. Didn’t keep running total but less than 5k

Joint income 250K+ - wedding 10yrs ago approx. 15K, honeymoon with our kids 3.5K. Had been together for a number of years before the wedding. I did a lot of it myself, bought a runway sample dress, did the interiors etc as I wanted it personal to me, kept numbers small. Spent what we would have spent on a huge wedding on an extension.. don't regret it for a minute!!

Income significantly less than these eye watering amounts and we spent $25 dollars at City Hall in NYC. Did it whilst on holiday and travelling in the US.

However rich I was I wouldn’t spend these quoted amounts. Each to their own but feels like a complete waste of money to me.

I agree. I know everyone is different, and there are cultural differences as well when it comes to weddings, however, even if we had more money at the time, I know we would never have been able to justify spending so much on one event.

Very similar to us.

We paid €600. The amounts being spent are bonkers!

Different people have different priorities and budgets 🤷‍♀️

For us it would have seemed odd to have a wedding breakfast that was less nice than the sort of dinners we would regularly have in restaurants. So we knew we wanted really good food and excellent champagne/ wine. We also wanted a real celebratory feel with lots of friends and family.

my parents enjoy hosting and are generous, so it was important to them that there was a free bar.

we ended up having our reception at a well known hotel in central london so those things combined to make a big bill. I don’t regret a penny.

What a completely patronising and unnecessary comment 🙄

The biggest cost for us was lunch at one of our favourite restaurants. We only took our two witnesses and one of their husbands.

I picked up my dress for £30 in a coast sale and have already worn it at another event.

Working at a wedding venue for a summer completely put me off the "big" wedding.

For us it was more about financial security. Neither of us had a burning desire to have a wedding we are both people who would do anything not to be in the limelight and public displays of affection. A big wedding just wouldn't have been in keeping with how we are.

Oh and had no money left for a honeymoon so had a mini-moon glamping in bath

Joint income = ~£200k
Wedding cost = ~£30k excl honeymoon but including rings (a third from one set of parents)

Second wedding in home country approx £40-50k, paid for by other set of parents

Weddings are a big deal in our culture and we already own a house