I think our parents gave us half the cost of the wedding and we made that and more back in gifts. Then his parents gave us more money for a down payment and his gma gave us money for half a car as a wedding gift. I don't think we would have had the same $$$ gifts with a scaled down wedding. Best of all worlds
Post by cricketwife on Oct 10, 2015 12:04:56 GMT -5
Our wedding cost $10k which we paid for ourselves. (In 2010, @idaholakelady, lol). It was the wedding of my dreams and I don't regret a penny. I already "owned " a house (mortgaged) and H and I got married later in life after a whirlwind romance. Our parents had never met prior to the rehearsal. Never again will I be surrounded by so many people I love at one time. We have a very modest house and I wouldn't trade the memories of that day for a larger one. That said, I had no desire to throw a 50k wedding or whatever.
Post by sillygoosegirl on Oct 10, 2015 12:19:02 GMT -5
Both, but a cheapish wedding, and the rest on the down payment. We didn't pay for our wedding, but I'm pretty sure our down payment was at least 10x the cost of our wedding. I'm glad we had a wedding, but equally glad it wasn't especially extravagant. The wedding money wouldn't have made that much difference on our house purchase anyway.
I'm very mm but I would pick the wedding. Those memories were worth the money x1000.
My parents paid for most of the wedding in cash (minus a few deposits we paid for). The money was set aside for me since I was little. They didn't ask if I wanted it for a house instead but I loved our wedding.
We bought our house on our own five years into our marriage.
I think our parents gave us half the cost of the wedding and we made that and more back in gifts. Then his parents gave us more money for a down payment and his gma gave us money for half a car as a wedding gift. I don't think we would have had the same $$$ gifts with a scaled down wedding. Best of all worlds
Everything about this is kind of mind-boggling to me. Both the idea of getting cash wedding gifts equaling more than half the cost of a wedding, and the idea that a less expensive wedding would yield less generous gifts. We had a fancy wedding with 300 guests and received a total of $1300 in cash gifts. But I do have 70 stems of Waterford crystal , so I guess there's that.
We definitely have the mentality of cover your plate and factor in the relationship in our community. My h has 4-5 relatives that each gave us $400. And they travelled to the wedding. I think that would have been the same regardless. But the friends who gave $2-300 would have given less or not been invited to a cake and tea reception. And his mothers head would have exploded if we didn't have a ballroom wedding. Lol.
And my parents always said tuition or wedding. But they did both $30k for their share of my education and about $8-10k for my wedding. And they are not wealthy just frugal. I hope to do the same for my kid. I doubt I would go out of my way for saving her a down payment.
And my parents always said tuition or wedding. But they did both $30k for their share of my education and about $8-10k for my wedding. And they are not wealthy just frugal. I hope to do the same for my kid. I doubt I would go out of my way for saving her a down payment.
Here's another (more kid related) question. If you are in a position to give your kids money like that someday, with no strings attached, do you think you will mind if they spend it on a wedding or a house (contrary to what you yourself might choose)?
I don't intend to give my kids that kind of money with no strings attached. We plan to pay for all or part of certain things (college, travel, moderately priced wedding, nice adult bike, maybe a first hand-me-down car), but having a big pile of money with no strings attached is what earning and saving up your own money is for, IMO.
House... We had a very, very small wedding. We paid about 1000 dollars total including my dress. The hall was 400 dollars, the food was gifted by my husband's chef friend, and we decorated ourselves. I am glad we didn't owe anything and have never regretted the smallness of our party.
We actually made money on the wedding because H's uncle gave us 1000 dollars, and we got some other monetary gifts. Profit! Lol
Post by thatgirl2478 on Oct 10, 2015 12:44:49 GMT -5
We bought our house within 3 months of being married. Probably not the best option, but whatever. When we bought it we had 0 down payment and couldn't afford a super great neighborhood (not awful, but no one wants to live there due to perceived violence). Looking back I would take the money and put it toward a house in a nicer neighborhood.
my wedding was 1/10 the amount of our DP. I would never have wanted a wedding that cost what our DP was. Too much pressure. That said, we already owned a home when we got married (heck, even before we were engaged) so it would have been a moot point. Both sides gave us $ as wedding presents after the fact
Yeah I was ok with it too. It wasn't all about us--it was a really big deal to my parents too. Basically I saw it as my parents planning a big fun party in our honor, and we got to invite all our friends and have a great time.Â
Yup, exactly. I never felt like our wedding was only about us, and didn't mind that at all. I
Same here. My parents spent a nice chunk of change and foregoing in lieu of a dp wasn't an option.
Also, did everyone actually pay cash for their weddings? I'm pretty sure that my parents put a lot of it on a credit card. And I can't really get too worked up about that since it was the party they wanted.
My parents paid $18K cash for my wedding (not everything was paid for by them but the reception in a tiny mountain town) Mostly paid for by my Mom. Our first house (we bought a few months before the wedding) was $128k & we put zero down on it. I'd take the wedding.
Post by ilikedonuts on Oct 10, 2015 13:32:41 GMT -5
We actually got both (wedding and house DP were paid for in cash) but if we had to choose we would have picked house down payment. My parents had the majority of the guest list for our wedding. So I let my mom do most of the planning. We paid for photographer and limo.
That being said my parents did have the option of vetoing our house choice, but they would have never actually exercised that option unless the house was basically about to collapse.
I loved our wedding so much. It was exactly what I wanted. It was big and happy and US. I wouldn't change a thing. It was $15-$20K and my parents paid for most of it.
I didn't want a house then and don't even really want a house now. $15K would be nowhere near enough for a down payment, nor have any of our parents ever expressed an interest in paying for us to buy a house.
I mean, if my parents had $50K they wanted to give me, I guess we could have spent $20K on the wedding and saved/kept $30K to eventually buy a house....
We already owned our house so the money my parents gave us toward our wedding went toward the wedding... But if we didn't already have a house, I'd vote for DP.
This... I wish they had offered for the house instead, but we weren't even engaged at the time.
Also, did everyone actually pay cash for their weddings? I'm pretty sure that my parents put a lot of it on a credit card. And I can't really get too worked up about that since it was the party they wanted.
We paid for our own wedding and paid cash.
We then saved for another year and bought a house. No regrets.
We paid with our cc and paid it off that month but used the points to pay for our honeymoon. MM winner.
Post by longtimenopost on Oct 10, 2015 15:18:00 GMT -5
House.
I think this is why I'm really struggling with my future SIL. Her parents, while keeping up an expensive lifestyle, did not save for her wedding so my brother is paying for it and it will probably cost a hundred grand. It partially his fault because he won't say no to her but I'm sure he would rather spend that money another way.
Post by residentdj on Oct 10, 2015 15:18:52 GMT -5
My IL's gave us money and told us to do what we wanted with it. I think they expected we would use it for the wedding, but we put that in the bank to use towards our house, then paid for our entire wedding ourselves in cash. Could we have used the money we spent on the wedding on the house instead and maybe gotten the house sooner? Probably. But I'm happy with what we did. We had a mid-size wedding (125 people) and it was a wonderful day. And bought our house a year later.
Post by leonard131 on Oct 10, 2015 15:21:50 GMT -5
My 43 old self says house but not sure what my 24 year old self would have said. My first wedding was grossly expensive and my parents paid for it. That money in 1998 would have gone a long way even in HCOL area. I knew it was crazy what that wedding costed at the time but I jail went with it. I didn't really care either way.
Second time around we all ready had the three houses and we paid for our wedding.
I do think it would be something we would offer up if we were looking at paying for a wedding for M. We would offer him money and let him choose.
Here's another (more kid related) question. If you are in a position to give your kids money like that someday, with no strings attached, do you think you will mind if they spend it on a wedding or a house (contrary to what you yourself might choose)?
I'm still having a hard time with this, because our DP was at least 7x the cost of our wedding.
I can't really see just randomly giving my kids either amount of money. If they were getting married I might give the smaller amount to them and say "if you don't want a big fancy wedding that's fine". If they had saved 8% or 18% for a DP I could see helping them with the last bit under certain circumstances. But that's about it. Wouldn't just give them the $$ for a vacation or a boat. So I guess I'd mind. Flame worthy?
ETA maybe given the cost of IF treatments or adoption, I'd help.
Here's another (more kid related) question. If you are in a position to give your kids money like that someday, with no strings attached, do you think you will mind if they spend it on a wedding or a house (contrary to what you yourself might choose)?
Interesting question. We plan to give our kid(s) this choice. The practical side of me hopes they would do the same as us, and have a nice down payment for their house. The other side of me wants to throw a giant beautiful wedding for my babeeeeyyyy. This would be much more enjoyable than my own wedding because I would not be the center of attention.
So I guess I would be happy either way.
I know, me too I hope at least one of them wants a fancy wedding paid for by the bank of mom and dad