Wedding loan help

[Emmaaaaaaaaa]

Hi!

Not a mum but I do love mums net just for the occasion gold it produces, anyways, you all also seem like a sound group of adult strangers to ask just how the hell anyone affords a wedding??

me and my partner have been together for 3 years and we both know we want to get enagaged so it’ll have soon but no rush etc but I just cannot fathom how people can afford weddings? All of our friends who have recently got married have said it cost around £20K but a loan of that size adds £300+ to our monthly bills for 5 years which realistically we cannot afford so how on earth does anyone get marrried these days or how did anyone else do it because even with both our parents help which they’ve both said they will give us something it’s not going to be thousands and I’m just not sure how everyone has these beautifull weddings without ending up in debt.

We had a beautiful tiny wedding with budget £2000

Basically we had 10 guests - parents, siblings, couple of best friends. This reduced pressure enormously as i didn't think that any of these closest people would be judging! I think with lots of guests there would have been more pressure

we got married in local parish church - this incurred a non negotiable fee. we booked a high end restaurant afterwards which was lovely

Best friends took photos using their phone so no photographer. no wedding car - just normal taxi. Wedding dress was from a charity shop that specialised in wedding dresses. I did have a small bouquet to walk into the church but no other flowers. We didn't have a honeymoon which was personal choice (i'm not keen on travel) but this could be done very affordably if you do want one!

If you haven't yet bought a house/ had children and also want these things - I would 100% prioritise saving for these

They’re my friends? Do you want me to find new 10 year friendships at 30? They did big loans and big weddings and that was their choice I just wanted to know if that was the norm or not and it’s nice to hear about different weddings!

You took my comments too seriously OP 😂

Your friends seem to be your main point of reference. Enough to make you panic at the cost of weddings. If you Google 'weddings under 5K', 'under 10K' etc there are plenty of ideas.
Also, it doesn't matter what strangers on MN say. If everyone around you has big, expensive weddings , that's the 'norm' for your circle. You might feel some peer pressure, in deviating from that. Especially as it looks like they're in a similar situation to you, without the money to pay and choosing to finance it with debt instead.
They're probably not the best people to discuss wedding decisions with as they might tell you that a lot of unnecessary but expensive things are important.
That's all I meant.

Although... perhaps, after all that, they may be able to reflect on the day and think about what seemed big in the beginning, but was actually pretty insignificant? Very few are going to be honest and tell you that they regret spending money though. Even if they do have any regrets. Or, they might not.

FWIW you're also going to be railroaded from all sides, vendors at wedding fairs, venues, etc they are all going to try to push things that you don't need. You might face pressure, comments and judgement from family and other people who have their own ideas of what a 'proper wedding' is like. If you worry about 'the norm' you're going to find it hard to push back. Stand firm and don't be influenced easily. I'm a stubborn mare, and even I found it difficult.

Best of luck with your wedding.

Op while it might be the norm in your circles to take a loan, I wouldn't any more than I'd pay Christmas on credit.
Why add that stress to the start of your married life, when you're also trying to save to get house deposits and save money to cover maternity leave?

Cut your cloth to suit your budget.

Shop around look at small local family run hotels, local golf club, football clubs, anywhere with a function suite, community centre, town hall some pubs also have function suites.

It might be cheaper to use caterers and a hall than to use a hotel.

Be ruthless with the guest list. And don't let parents add tons of people.

Definitely agree with parents!
Not really answering the OP's Q's. But many don't understand how expensive things are these days, they had a big wedding for crumbs in 199X...

TBF. 'Venues' are expensive and have become more so as less people get married in church. But religious venues are still quite cheap for parishioners - even York Minister is very much cheaper for the locals.

Church wedding + pub reception used to be how people did it. But of course food for lots of people is still expensive. These days some fancy restaurants themselves can be licensed venues so the wedding can be held there itself.

Beware the registrar fee can be anywhere from £200 - £800 depending on the council charge for where you get married! If you want to save this you can do the statutory legal ceremony for £57 and then get a celebrant/anybody else to officiate but of course many people consider this cheating. In which case the solution is just to marry in a council area with lower fees.

I got married 10 years ago and I remember getting sucked in to a lot of 'you have to spend x' chat and in the end we probably did spend somewhere in the region of £10-15k (including honeymoon) for quite a big wedding (80 all day) at a castle etc. I don't remember all the specifics but:

• my dad paid for the venue. So whatever is was per head for the ceremony and food etc
• my mum paid for my dress (£1500)
• we paid everything else which was maybe around £7k. I scrimped on all the things that weren't important to me and spent on the things that were.
• our honeymoon was cheap as chips. A hut on a beach in Thailand. Nothing flash!

I don't regret any of it but maybe I would have done less if I had the chance to do it again.

I think people get very fixated on having all the things at their weddings. It was quite a while ago now but we saved a lot by shopping doing some of these things.
Got married on a weekday
Had a smaller photography package, a couple of hours to cover the wedding and some photos afterwards. Had Pimms and lemonade rather than champagne as the first round of drinks. Obviously a lot of people hire multiple photographers to capture the entire day from getting ready till the evening etc. You will get lots of photos from family and friends anyway. We kept the day quite small about 70 guest, had more in the evening. We had a dj rather than a live band (although I actually wish we had paid for a band) Did hog roast for the evening buffet. Picked a smaller venue. Bought an off the shelf cake and had flowers on it. We had a lovely day, everyone enjoyed it. It doesn't need to be extravagant. We've been to other much bigger and more expensive weddings where despite the hosts spending many thousands more than us, the food was rubbish, the wine was like vinegar and the atmosphere was no different.

Don't get caught up with the idea of the formal wedding breakfast, I've been to weddings where a fish and chip van turned up. Don't try and pay for all the booze. Don't have too many ushers or Bridesmaids.

Me and DP are getting married in June. We have saved 1k and taken a loan out for 2k. We are having an extremely modest wedding, registry office ceremony, followed by 3 course meal and champagne at a naice local pub afterwards for 20.

Ceremony - £152
Meal - £650
Taxis for us all to pub - £50
My dress, DP and DCs suits - £500
Rings - £350

My sister is a professional baker and is doing our cake. friend is a photographer so is bringing along her camera - will give them both a gift or money of some description as a thank you.

But all in less than 2 grand. The remaining money we’re going on a family holiday to Majorca for 10 days 2 days after the wedding.

The loan repayments are something like £90 a month over 2 years but will pay this down sooner, we just wanted to get it all booked straight away.

My best friend got married a couple of years ago and like you said, spent £27,000 on her wedding. Her dress alone cost double what we’re spending on our entire day! They were repaying £400 for something like 5 year! It was a beautiful day but I just couldn’t comprehend it.

ETA - my bouquet and the boys flower pins I will be doing myself.

@macedoniann
I was more thinking about the Reception rather than the wedding ceremony.

I'd keep service costs low church or register office.

Oh of course, I was referring to parents not understanding the cost of things. Hence wanting to add on a lot of guests.
not me, but a friend's parents contributed £500 and got upset that they couldn't invite a load of their friends...

Ours was under £10k in all.

Rings, outfits, flowers, BM dresses, cake, registry office, photographer, food and alcohol in a hired restaurant (we had it all Saturday)

We live in London so just held it there - no one needed hotels and could get tube or Uber home. .
It was a fancy place the wine was all at least £40 per bottle plus service and we could have done it a lot cheaper.

It was great everyone had a lovely time.

We had 35 people and used savings.
No way would I take a loan.

We are high earners but I think expensive weddings are a trend people get sucked into.
My husband wanted a 120 person wedding that would realistically have cost £60-65k.

Even he admits now it would have been a huge huge mistake.