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Seriously, how much should this whole shindig cost?! I mean, we are creeping up on about $18000 right now. This does not include our honeymoon expenses. I know this might be a personal question, but I am curious what other brides are looking to spend? I live in Charleston, SC and I know my area can be a bit pricey. My parents graciously gave us a $12000 budget so the rest will be out of pocket, but I just get a bit overwhelmed. I sit here like, yup, that is almost a brand new car, or a sweeeeet down payment on a house. Haha. Clearly I am losing my mind. Thank goodness that I have plenty of time to rethink vendors.
EDIT: I didn't know where to post this... :/
Ours is in the Los Angeles area and will be between $75,000 and $80,000. The crazy thing is we are also not going totally overboard with costs, we are doing things to save money such as hiring a DJ rather than a full band and its still costing this much.
We are paying for our wedding rings and honeymoon ourselves, so that cost will be an additional $23,000 (including the e-ring). Granted if we had to go into debt for this, we wouldn't be spending this amount on these items. Fortunately, my parents are paying for the wedding and reception.
Our wedding was approximately $20,000 with about $2000 for the honeymoon in addition. We originally tried for $10,000 but it didn't happen. Know you can always negotiate prices, especially in these economic times.
For us, that is a lot of money, but if you can do it, and it won't put you in the poor house, then go for it.
I have set our budget at $5,000 with a cap of $7,000 for everything; including the honeymoon. I can't justify spending more than that. I am doing a lot of stuff DIY too, so that will save us a lot of money. And that total does include a wedding planner.
Ours is in Lexington, KY. We don't really have a budget that my parents have given us (thought I expect they think it'll end up being 50k) but I would be devastated to go above 25k.
I think ours is teetering around 20K... its being split between my parents, his parents and ourselves. We are doing what we can on our own and doing some DIY. I am doing TONS of research on budget and costs to be sure we don't get anything for more than we should pay!
We live in NYC..my original budget was $45K ..now its closer to $60K not including the honeymoon...more than I wanted to spend since we are paying for it ourselves but having what I want and it being nice is more important than saving an extra $15K...
Also in NYC...right now our budget is around 65k, with that being split between our two sets of parents and ourselves. It's definitely more than I thought we would spend, but it's really really REALLY hard to do an inexpensive wedding in New York, especially when my FI has 100 invites from his family alone!
We have a $10,000 wedding-only budget in Sedona, AZ for approx 60 people. That doesn't include our rings $2,300 (a steal from www.IDoNowIDont.com) or honeymoon to Italy $5,000. So I guess technically it's $17,300. Wow, I think that's the first time I've included Italy and rings.
Ours cost around 31K, but that doesn't include my e-ring, wedding rings, or the honeymoon. We were trying to stay around 25K, but that just didn't happen for us.
um...so I'm doing a wedding in FL for under 10K. Hopefully. I guess, we aren't high end area though...
We have 120ish guests.
It also includes our wedding rings though our honeymoon is being paid by his parents and they gave us a few thousand dollars to go to Europe. I'm not sure where yet. Maybe Italy :D
I'm in Chicago and trying to do it for under $15,000 for 75 guests. Wish me luck! I'm planning on doing lots and lots of bargain hunting, especially since my FI and I are paying for most of it ourselves!
Hey ladies! This is all very GREAT information!
I am personally a wedding vendor and with these tough economic times i am willing to work with brides on their budget.
If you guys are trying to save some money buts till get a BEAUTIFUL wedding, try a wedding on an off day, like a Friday or Sunday. Sunday weddings have been very popular here in Georgia.
Also, there are slower months that we offer discounts for as well, Jan, Feb, July
I think it's great that you guys are all trying to stick to your budget, along with doing some DIY things! Very cool!!
Best of luck to all of you!
I'm on Plan C now and it's the easiest yet. A simple Hawaiian ceremony on a beach with just the two of us: $2000, plane tickets $2000, honeymoon $2-3000, plain gold wedding bands $600, my dress $300, veil $100, groom's tie $50, accessories & misc wedding related stuff I've been buying $50.
That's approx $7000 - 8000 and if I add a ukelele player, new beach attire and slippers for the Fi, and earrings, it all equals to much more than I am fooling myself to believe!
BTW, the $2000 ceremony includes photography (pictures on a CD), and flowers.
Our wedding, reception and pig roast the day after ran us about $5,000. Then again, the venue was free and we just had light refreshments and cake after the service. Actually, I paid for the wedding and he paid for the honeymoon to the Bahamas.
Our budget is around 20k, though I'm *hoping* we come in lower than that. That doesn't include rings or a honeymoon. We are paying for 90%+ ourselves.
We're getting married out on an island, which is more $$ because it's an ocean view/front venue, and the food/drinks are top of the line. I can't cut those costs, but am trying to cut other costs in any way possible - DIY for the STD, invitations, most of the flowers and decorations.
We could have gone a cheaper route, but for many of our guests it will be their first trip to New England, and we wanted something that would really "show off" our area of the world to our friends and family from out of state, and be a really memorable experience for everyone :) (but yeah, it's hard parting with 20k of my hard earned cash!!)
I always think of this post as the be all end all of Weddingbee budget posts. What I like about it is that it takes into account region, size of wedding, etc., which can definitely skew costs. It's long but it's pretty comprehensive.
Enjoy!
<p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica;">http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/what-didwill-your-wedding-cost
I like the format of the board Msswan suggested, so I'll follow it here!
1) San Diego
2) 85 people
3) $20,000 without rings and honeymoon although I'm trying to keep it under that.
*I few years ago I had no money from parents but amazingly now I do. Mom is giving $20,000; Dad $5,000. Trying to keep things as low as possible (tough to do in San Diego) and spend the rest on house improvements.
Going back to my post above, just to give a perspective. I'm watching the new season of Platinum Weddings right now (the new episode airs today) and the wedding is costing $500,000 and is taking place at my exact same venue. The bride is also wearing a dress by the same designer as mine. So my $80,000 is chump change compared to her $500,000 at the same venue. So it really is all relative.
i like the format of that post too!
1.) 90-130 guests (since the invites are not out yet, this is just a guess)
2.) Milwaukee, WI, USA
3.) $5,000*
*This does not include our rings which were $800 for e-ring and 2 bands nor the cost of our honeymoon which is "unbooked" yet, but will just be 3 days, 2 nights camping at a state park. So, maybe $200 all told for gas, site fee, and food. I am building in a buffer though, in case something goes really wrong. So all told, I am budgeting $7,000 for the whole wedding, and hoping to keep it under $5,000. My dad is giving us $3,000, my mom $300, and his parents $1,000. The rest is out of pocket.
1) New York State (not far outside of the city).
2) 130 people.
3) Probably $25,000, including honeymoon.
We are spending around $34-40k and luckily are parents are paying for almost everything...I think that weddings cost can vary greatly and still be beautiful! I've seen a gorgeous wedding for $5000 and a gorgeous wedding for $80k
I'm doing a Saturday wedding in June for just under a hundred guests for less than 6,000. I'm doing alot of DIY and have been planning long enough to get great deals on things like the all-inclusive venue and the photographer who will be there all day for less than 500 bucks (engagement pics were included in that price!). We are paying for our own wedding and to help cut costs my dress is a bridesmaid dress (less than 150 and I wanted to wear red anyway!) we are doing a smaller wedding cake and a large sheet cake (which will double as a groom's cake) and the flower girl dresses were bought on clearance at Old Navy. Also, I'm a total coupon whore and I haven't paid full price for any decor or stationary supplies (including candles, arbor decor, etc.) Michael's probably hates me but all those seperate transactions add up to big savings. It's been alot of work and price comparisons and waiting for sales but it's totally worth it!!
I absolutely love to read about other weddings and I love that everyone seems happy with what their budget can produce, whether it's 2 grand or 100 grand!!
We're having two weddings, one now and one later after all the immigration stuff is completed. The current has a budget of $2000, we may be slightly over. And honeymoon has a $1000 price tag. I've planned everything down to the last cent.
We are looking to spend about $8000 not including honeymoon. We are inviting about 60 ppl and it is going to be in Vegas. The photographer is a friend of mine and is only requiring 2 plane tickets and a hotel room for all the pictures and the copyrights which I love him for and 2 of my bridesmaids and I worked at a flower shop for 3-4 years so we are doing all the flowers ourselves. His parents gave us $4,000 for the wedding so we are only having to pay the other half and for the honeymoon.
Just wanted to add a thanks for starting this thread. It really got me calculating and comparing costs. It's so easy to get swept up into the moment! I'm now attempting to stick to my original budget of $5000 for everything.
How it's looking so far:
1) Sweden or Hawaii
2) about 10 just the 2 of us
3) under $6000 trying to make it cheaper than < ---
1) NYC
2) 130 people
3) $11,000 - not including honeymoon, rings, or dress though
******it's doable, watch me. ;)
Right now...
I just got engaged less than too weeks ago and we are in the process of booking the hall and caterer and we are at about $8k (That doesn't include the cake, dj, decor).
I know it will be a lot more because my parents want to invite everyone that they have meet lol.
1) Los Angeles
2) 50 people
3) $20,000
Our budget did include the rings, but not the honeymoon. Hopefully nothing unexpected pops up, but as of right now, we're pretty close to our budget.
We're looking at around $15K for 70 guests in Victoria, Australia. This includes everything except for our honeymoon which we're planning on registering with a travel agent (my step sister & BM) in the hopes of having a Roman holiday/honeymoon!
We're cutting costs by having DIY invites, menues, STD's and having an Ipod reception. Our venue has also very kindly said that my mum and sister can raid their garden (we're getting married at a massive open garden) for flowers for our centrepieces.
We're splurging on the photographer ($2,500) and my dress ($1,700) which I'm having custom made. We're super lucky in that the costs are being split between my mum and the fella's parents. We really wanted to do a 3 way split b/w us, my mum and the fella's parents but his parents have said they'd rather pay for our share and for whatever money we have to go towards a house. Thanks Future Parent's In Law!
This is an interesting thread, I'm always so impressed with people doing their wedding's for under 10k!
Here goes:
1) Upstate New York (but not as cheap as it should be since it's almost in the Berkshires, MA, which is a bit posh)
2) 175-200 guests (Pushed up the cost a lot)
3) 45k (!!!!!!!!!! How did that happen??)
Scary when you put it out like that....That does not include the honeymoon or any other wedding-related events, like the RD or morning-after brunch...
1) Dallas, TX
2) 125 - 150 guests (trying to get it down, but doubt that will happen)
3) 30K - 35K, this includes the honeymoon & rings. FI & I are paying for half and my parents are paying for the other half.
1. Western MA area
2. Approx. 175 guests
3. We are trying to stay at $20k or under (not including the rings/bands/honeymoon which we are paying for ourselves). Our parents gave us $16k combined & the rest is out of our own pocket - blah. I wish now that we just eloped b/c spending this much money on 1 day makes me want to be sick but there's no turning back now - 5 months to go!
1. Western MA area
2. Approx. 175 guests
3. We are trying to stay at $20k or under (not including the rings/bands/honeymoon which we are paying for ourselves). Our parents gave us $16k combined & the rest is out of our own pocket - blah. I wish now that we just eloped b/c spending this much money on 1 day makes me want to be sick but there's no turning back now - 5 months to go!
We are at about $22,000 with dress but no honeymoon or any rings. Ah! That is scary. And now I am seriously considering adding another $2000 for a real DJ (not my friendor) and some additional rentals for our barebones space. Ugh.
I'm having 75 guests, its in CO, and hopefully a budget of 3k, although there's a possibility the whole thing may get canceled.
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