Last month I announced how I got engaged and was super excited about it. I kind of dropped a ball with that post and mentioned we would be planning a wedding rapidly despite our debt and I would still try to have my dream day on a budget. Then I pretty much just left you guys hanging and scratching your heads.
Getting engaged and starting the planning process the week of was a lot for me to process but I wanted to prepare a series that would explain every step of my planning from a financial standpoint along with a little fun, since I do run a personal financed blog and all. Also, I think this new series will help others understand that you can have your dream wedding without spending $26,000.
I wanted to start things off by sharing our budget, what we’ve done so far, and what we plan to do to pull off our dream wedding day without overspending.
Table of Contents
Again, Why We Aren’t Waiting to Get Married
- Lately I feel like I’ve been sacrificing everything. I want to do something now that makes me happy and I don’t want my debt to control that.
- I feel like a wedding is just a day, a marriage is supposed to last forever so we might as well do the planning quick and not drag everything out. Plus, it might end up costing more if we give ourselves too much time to plan.
How We Came up with Our Dream Wedding Day Budget
We both agreed that a realistic amount to shell out for this wedding would be $7,000 total which would mean $3,500 from each of us. This would represent how much money the both of us want to spend total. If family members want to help us out or cover an expense they can, but we want to pay for most of the wedding by ourselves.
We decided to split the venue between our parents, so we are paying half and our parents are splitting the other half four ways. Other than that, I believe we can budget properly and pay for everything else ourselves.
In order to come up with our budget of $7,000, we considered:
- Where we wanted to get married. (Getting married in the suburbs is way cheaper than doing it in the city)
- How many people we wanted to invite (Around 100)
- Our income and what we could afford to set aside each month
- What we really truly wanted at our wedding
Being Honest about What You Really Want
I want a nice ‘dream wedding’. Luckily, my dreams are not super luxurious and I’m willing to compromise and not attempt to have it all. I brought up doing a backyard wedding at my mom’s house and while we both agreed that might save money, we decided to go with an all-inclusive venue because it would be less stressful to have everything set up and coordinated for us.
What’s important to me and what I care about the most and would like to see/have at the wedding
- Our first song. We haven’t decided yet.
- Custom vows. We are both writers, so our vows should be interesting 🙂
- Booking a nice, spacious venue
- Providing a meal for everyone
- Getting to see all my friends and family members and share this experience with them
- Pretty centerpieces and decorations
- Gorgeous bouquets, whether they’re real or fake. I haven’ decided yet.
Things I don’t really care about that much or want
- Expensive engagement photos
- Save-the-date magnets and cards that are going to cost a pretty penny to order and ship and will probably just end up lost or in everyone’s trash a few months later. Maybe we can just do a save-the-date Facebook event, haha.
- Photos of myself getting ready for the ceremony and looking a hot mess. I may invite the photographer right before the ceremony start time to save money and avoid having to look back at any embarrassing photos.
- A $1,000 designer dress. I actually like fashion and looking nice, but never in a million years would I pay that much for a dress I’m only going to wear once. Who can tell if it’s designer anyway?!?
- Getting everyone drunk. No open bar over here…
- Having a huge fancy cake. We might even do cupcakes. Cake is cake. It looks beautiful but ultimately you eat it and it’s gone. Taste is more important than appearance to us.
By deciding what I want and don’t want and communicating those ideas to my whateveryouwantbabe type of fiancé, we can start to pinpoint a vision and clear plan for having a wedding with everything we want that still honors our budget.
Getting the Big Expenses Out of the Way
If you’re planning a wedding, I would recommend getting the largest expenses out of the way first, then trickling down to the smaller stuff. I am lucky that we quickly decided on a nice venue that was within our budget to secure the wedding date. We pretty much knew what we wanted and the price was right with this location so we quickly put 30% and will pay the rest up by March.
I love that it’s all inclusive, the food will be buffet style, there’s no surprises or stupid miscellaneous extras like a cake cutting fee, and we even get centerpieces with fresh flowers included in the package. We will do a cash bar package for now, seeing as the venue price nearly doubled when they totaled up how much the cash bar would cost for 5 hours.
Now that we’ve got the food and venue out of the way, I may start looking around at dresses because I know it can take months to order things and go through the alteration process. We are also on the lookout for affordable photographers and cake options.
A Small Win: $20 Engagement Photos
Initially, I wasn’t in favor of doing professional engagement photos. In all honesty, you can save a ton by asking a friend or family member to snap engagement shots, then having your photos printed yourself. I figured we might just borrow my sister’s DLSR camera, take some photos together and call it a day. Then, I noticed a Groupon for a professional outdoor photo shoot for just $20.
The normal rate, $125 for a 30-minute professional shoot would have been out of the question. But for $20 and a few print photos and a high-resolution digital image included, I figured we should jump on it. The photographer took multiple photos so I’m sure they will try to sell us more images but it still won’t cost much if we decided to buy anything additional. Plus, we don’t have to purchase all the images we want right this second. They will be stored online where we can order them anytime or when a sale comes up.
Overall, it was not a bad start to my frugal wedding planning.
More From the Series
Smart Ways to Save on Your Dream Wedding
How to Through a Last-Minute Bridal Shower
How to Save Money on Wedding Flowers
25+ Ways to Save BIG on Your Dream Wedding
My Wedding Budget Review + Pictures
If you’d like more specific tips and strategies to help you save money on your big day without sacrificing your values, I recently released a 50-page digital guide called Save Thousands on Your Dream Wedding and you can learn more about it here. My guide includes real money-saving strategies, resources you can utilize when shopping for even the tiniest details, the strategy I used to go on a $400 week-long honeymoon and more!
What are some things that you like to see at weddings and some things you think are just unnecessary? Did you do an open bar at your wedding or would you?
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Tonya @ Budget and the Beach says
ha ha good question. I’m actually editing a wedding video right now that had to cost at LEAST one million dollars. It was oceanside and even had aerial artists to entertain the guests. The cake looked…not even like a cake, but like I tree. The whole thing is just over the top if you ask me. I would have LOVED to have been a guest, because to me, that’s who it seemed like it was for. Not the bride and groom.
La Shaun@ Divas R Frugal says
Exactly…. They spent their day impressing and pleasing others.
Choncé says
That’s CRAZY! It does sound beautiful though, but I could never spend that much, for obvious reasons 🙂 It sounds like they were trying to go overboard with impressing the guests (which is something I will not do) but they could also just have very expensive tastes
Kate @ Cashville Skyline says
I planned events in my previous career and I couldn’t believe how expensive things would get. It sounds like you’re taking the right approach by prioritizing what’s important. After all, it’s your day. Too many people get wrapped up in what’s best for everyone else!
Choncé says
Thanks Kate! I agree that I just need to stay focused on what we both want and need.
My Urban Family says
It is crazy how much a wedding can add up to! I love that you’re taking the time to decide what is important and what isn’t so much. And that is amazing that you were able to find such a cheap price for engagement photos!! For the save the date, maybe you can use a website instead of mailing cards? I believe the knot has templates and free pages you can make.
Choncé says
That’s a great ideas actually! I’ll have to look into it. I think save the dates are cool and all but I just never understood them or thought they were that valuable and the money could be best spent elsewhere in our budget. Since our wedding will be only a few months away soon, it doesn’t really make sense to send a formal reminder then an invitation a month or two later.
lovetteorleavette says
It sounds like you have everything under control! I imagine your special day will be fabulous and can’t wait for the pictures ( if you share)!
Choncé says
I might share the good ones! 🙂
La Shaun@ Divas R Frugal says
Congrats on your engagement!! I am newly engaged also and I get overwhelmed just thinking about planning a wedding and the expenses. It looks like you have everything planned out. Pictures ( and maybe video) are necessary. The last wedding I attended did not have an open bar. If I wanted drinks you had to pay. I didn’t waste my money. I was happy with the champagne provided for the toast and juice lol. The only thing that matters ( IMO) is that you look geogeous, have pics ( and maybe video), have fun with your husband, and have no wedding debt at the end.
Choncé says
Thanks La Shaun and congrats on your engagement as well! The points you mentioned are definitely what truly matters. We will definitely have a champagne toast and depending on how well the budget goes, we may add a mini open bar later on since it will be much cheaper than doing the 5 hour thing but a cash bar is fine with me as well.
Jessica @ Settle Your Finances says
It is insane how expensive some weddings can end up being. My husband and I went super simple and had a courthouse wedding and used our money to buy a house instead. At the time, it seemed like a great idea, but I have to admit that I do kind of wish we had nice wedding pictures. You are so smart to determine what is and what isn’t important for your wedding early on. That way you can have the day of your dreams without having to pay too much. Good luck with finding a dress. I’m sure you can find something lovely for a great price.
Choncé says
We want to spend the bulk of our money on a down payment for a house as well. I’m excited about the wedding but I know that one day will go by fast so I’d rather have more money for our future together.
Jason @ TheButlerJournal.com says
I literally laughed out loud when you said no open bar. That’s smart though. I’ve been to a few weddings where they had open bars. They don’t come cheap!
Choncé says
Nope. It’s crazy that when he quoted us for the price of the venue with open bar, I was about to grab my purse and walk out. Then when we told him to quote us without open bar, the price dropped nearly by half.
Cat@BudgetBlonde says
I love budget wedding posts. We had a beautiful wedding, but we also didn’t want to spend an arm and a leg on it. Congrats girl! Can’t wait to hear more about your budget wedding. 🙂
Choncé says
Thanks Cat!
creativebugger1 says
Weddings can be crazy expensive, I’m glad you’re not going to blow a fortune. We got married in Vegas and to save on the dress I made my own. I used coupons and purchased the supplies I needed for around $50 (without, it would’ve been around $110). It took four days. I bought my shoes (which you couldn’t even see) on sale at Payless for less than $10. I’m with you that the wedding is just one day and that the marriage is what matters.
Have you ever seen TLC’s “Say Yes to the Dress?” The amount of money those brides (or rather their parents) drop on a dress just blows my mind.
Choncé says
I love that show but it’s so crazy how much the women spend on their dress. I really really hope I can find something nice and affordable. It sound like you saved a ton on your wedding and took advantage of some great deals!
FF @ Femme Frugality says
Super smart on the venue! My first wedding was DIY and it was a total pain. Second time was an inclusive venue… Much better! Second time was cash bar, too. The people who will care don’t belong in my humble opinion.
With the dress, my only warning is that alterations can cost the same as the dress or more… Especially if you’re buying on a small budget! So it’s good to factor that in. I wasn’t quite expecting that.
Can’t wait to follow along with your journey! Know it will be a beautiful day for two beautiful people!
Choncé says
Thanks for the tip Femme! I am considering alterations but had no idea what the costs could be like so that’s great to keep in mind so I’m not shocked t the last minute.
Kristi @ Femme Frugality says
It sounds like you’ll have a lovely wedding! You can do a lot for a wedding with $7000. It’s so important to focus on what will make you and your spouse happy, because it is your day after all!
Choncé says
Thanks Kristi!
Latoya S says
Hi Chonce, I’m relatively new here, but I have been reading allll the posts since I discovered you:) I got married 6 years ago and we had an $8,000 budget too (and it included the honeymoon)! We were able to save drastically on our venue since my husband’s father was former military and we decided to get married at the NCO club at our local army base.
Your budget is totally doable and I commend you for setting your heart on the things that matter to you most. Some things that I had to have at my wedding…I really wanted nice programs since I’m a visual person and I keep stuff like that. We ended up diy-ing ours. We didn’t do an open bar because it was too expensive and most of our guest list didn’t drink.
If there’s anything you need help with or you want to pick my brain about other ways we saved money on our day, just give me a holler:)
Choncé says
Hi Latoya! Thanks so much for reading 🙂 Sounds like you did very well on your wedding budget! We could do an open bar and still have the option to but I think we will just stick with a cash bar because I don’t want to get dangerously close to my spending limit, plus if people have to buy their own drinks they should drink less and less drunk people is always a good thing, haha.
DC @ Young Adult Money says
So excited for you guys! I think you have a great plan. Not only do you have a budget set, you also know what you care about. If you just focus on what you care about it seems like everything else will fall in place. Looking forward to more posts about this – people LOVE wedding-related content 😉
Choncé says
Thanks D.C! It’s going to be fun to share most of this stuff so I can look back on it later 🙂
srahjayne17 says
I’m planning my wedding on April 30th!!! I a couple of things I found:
1. Walmart.com has great rates on save the dates
2. Download the App WISH. it takes forever for these items to ship but I got my wedding veil for $2 and guest seating cards for $15!
3. DOLLAR. STORE. I’m concerned about pretty centerpieces. I went to the dollar store and bought a bunch of vases and bowls (I’m having a candy buffet) for $73. I had a $50 gift card from my bridal shower so the vases are covered for next to nothing!
Happy Planning!! 🙂
Choncé says
Thanks so much for the tips! I will definitely check out App WISH 🙂