While any major party or event has its costs, weddings with ridiculous price tags are becoming increasingly common. In fact, the cost of weddings in recent years has forced some couples to put off tying the knot altogether. The average amount spent on a traditional American wedding is $34,000. However, if you’re looking to have a more budget-friendly wedding, the good news is: There are ways to celebrate a frugal wedding.
With that in mind, here are four tips that will help you avoid going broke when tying the knot:
Schedule For Savings
Most people traditionally choose to have their weddings on weekends. So scheduling your wedding for a weekday or unconventional time can help cut down on costs. Many vendors and venues lower their prices during less popular times to help draw in business more consistently. Also consider scheduling your wedding for an off season, like late fall or winter. True, you may have to contend with the weather. But an indoor wedding can be gorgeous and also save you plenty of cash.
Consider Uncommon Venues
Just because most weddings take place in a church or other religious venue doesn’t mean yours has to. Rather than shelling out thousands of dollars for a popular or “traditional” venue, look for more affordable options, like renting a public park. You can even get creative with your venue choice for a truly unforgettable event. So try contacting your local museum, library, or even the zoo for a unique wedding that people will talk about for years to come. You’ll find they come at a fraction of the cost of a traditional ballroom or religious setting.
Slim Down Spending
When looking at vendors, decorations, and other party-planning details, go down the list and see just how much you really need to be spending. Not everything requires you to hire a vendor; for example, feel free to skip on the DJ. Plenty of apps and programs exist nowadays for you to manage the music yourself. The ideal playlist for a three-hour party is 52 songs long, so go ahead and pick out your favorites to make a party playlist without the price of a DJ.
Think Outside the Box
Remember that at the end of the day, your wedding is your own. While there might be some pressure from family or friends to organize your big day in a certain way, there aren’t actually any rules saying what makes a wedding good or not. If you want a traditional wedding with all the works, that’s perfectly fine. However, if your ideal wedding has you thinking outside the box, that’s great too. Going for more unconventional weddings can also offer you more ways to save, so look at ways that people are breaking tradition for your wedding inspiration.
Ultimately, a wedding shouldn’t put you into uncontrollable debt. FICO recommends that your credit utilization ratio should not be higher than 30% of your original credit limit, so if you find yourself pushing your credit limit to accommodate your wedding spending, consider using a few of these tips to reduce the cost of tying the knot.
Photo Credit: stock photo
I was married twice. And, by the way, spending a ton of money on a wedding when half of the marriage end in divorce is like flushing money down the toilet.
The first time, my finance and I spoke to my parents about a wedding and went to their church to see what was on offer. My mom had worked on the committee that arranged wedding receptions at the church and immediately was planning her idea of a perfect wedding. The church had a list of preferred music and pre-marriage sessions. If we were going to have music any husband probably would have preferred loud rock and neither of us wanted religious instruction. So we went to a JP’s office in clothes we already owned. The Justice of the Peace’s wife was our witness. We then went out by ourselves to dinner and a movie. The J.P. was not allowed to charge if in his own office, but we could offer a donation. The cost of dinner, movie, J.P., license and blood tests, was about $35. About a year later, my parents decided to give us a wedding gift. We were moving so they gave us a refrigerator. (I think they waited, because they were sure I was pregnant because we eloped. I wasn’t.) We didn’t have a honeymoon until 1976, and by then the marriage was failing.
Fast forward to 1985. Husband #2 and I decided to have a slightly more formal wedding at my mother’s home. We invited a Unitarian minister who let us write our own ceremony which we created to satisfy our non-religious selves but not offend my Protestant or his Catholic family. We had a total of 17 people including ourselves, close family, and the minister. My mom and aunt made a light dinner, his brother brought champaign, my sister provided the cake, and his sister some Belgium chocolates. We requested no gifts, except for the things they offered to provide, but we got a few gifts anyway, but they were not expensive. I went to an open market to buy flowers which i arranged myself. My husband chose some music. He bought a new suit and I chose an off-white suit for myself. Along with shoes, tie, blouse, shirt, license, a donation to the minister, flowers, etc. we spent about $800, most of which went for my husband’s suit. (Mine was on sale.)
That was in March. I was a teacher, so we waited until summer to take a honeymoon, which we also did on a budget. We drove to DC, stayed at a mid-range motel in MD, took the subway into the city to see the sights. That 5-day trip in 1985 probably cost about $300. I remember motel rooms were running about $35.
One other alternative we considered was renting a picnic grove at a local park and having a pot-luck picnic. I had a friend who wrote and performed Irish Folk music that I thought would be great for a picnic. People I worked with played volleyball a lot, so we would have arranged for a picnic grove with a volleyball court. The reason we didn’t do that was because the only time my sister-in-law could be in town was late March and the weather was too iffy for a picnic. It ended up being a rather cold day. We could have invited many more people, but another problem is that my husband is not comfortable with large groups. Seventeen was at the peak of his limit.
I don’t regret either wedding choice.
Wow … thanks for sharing your experiences and budget tips, CJ!
As for divorce, they are just plain expensive – in more ways than one.