The average wedding cost is now around $30,000. Do you think it's gotten out of control.

Years ago, a nurse I worked with, paid off her house. She was so happy; she was planning on retiring. Her daughter then wanted to get married. So, she remortgaged the house. She now had to work till age 68 to pay off the house. There was this huge wedding. About a month after the wedding, her daughter got an annulment- hubby couldn't get it up-apparently, she was the wrong sex. I thought spending all the money on a one day event was stupid. Brand new marriages don't need "memories", they need cold hard cash. What they spent on the wedding would have put a huge downpayment on a house, which would have meant lower payments, etc. And my nurse friend was stupid to go so far into debt for one event.
I know of a couple, who spent $5,000 on a wedding photographer ( about $10,000, today). DUMB.
 

We had a small church wedding with only a matron of honor & best man. Our family & friends were there & our reception was held in the church hall so no one had to drive to another location. We had a florist for flowers & a photographer. My friend, who did wedding cakes on the side, did mine as our wedding gift. Another friend's dad ran a small neighborhood carryout that had a deli section who gave us a deal on the meat/cheese trays/sides. We did a lot of the work ourselves getting all of the misc. items together & it up setting up ourselves instead of paying a "Wedding Planner" to do it. But at that time, I didn't know what they were.

We had everything we wanted to have at a cost of around $2,000 in 1990. Hubby & I paid for it ourselves since we both worked full time & my parents were retired. It doesn't have to be fancy to be nice.
 
it is just a keeping up with the Jones type thing ........ sold as you have to do this or that have had many friends who went in to debt to pay for child's wedding only to end up divorced quickly etc .... one girl was actually pissed parents would not spend it all over for second wedding cause they were still paying off the first.
Both my kids had simple put together most done by ourselves their choice and at sons wedding at a very popular cozy venue one employee of place told me it was the best put together event she had seen. total cost was about 4k and
 

For those not wealthy I don't understand wanting to go deep in debt to get married. Practical & debt free getting started I guess is not how so many view the way to begin married life.

Our wedding & honeymoon cost was less than $1000.00 I was in the Navy & all the squadron brown baggers [married] were able to buy booze. They all bought at least one bottle of booze. That was delivered to my future brides uncles restaurant where we had our reception. The cake was donated by one of her cousins. Living in Puerto Rico was an automatic honeymoon location. Pre paid cabin rental in the rain forest of El Yunque was really cheap back in 1962.
 
We had a small church wedding with only a matron of honor & best man. Our family & friends were there & our reception was held in the church hall so no one had to drive to another location. We had a florist for flowers & a photographer. My friend, who did wedding cakes on the side, did mine as our wedding gift. Another friend's dad ran a small neighborhood carryout that had a deli section who gave us a deal on the meat/cheese trays/sides. We did a lot of the work ourselves getting all of the misc. items together & it up setting up ourselves instead of paying a "Wedding Planner" to do it. But at that time, I didn't know what they were.

We had everything we wanted to have at a cost of around $2,000 in 1990. Hubby & I paid for it ourselves since we both worked full time & my parents were retired. It doesn't have to be fancy to be nice.
Agreed. It seems somewhere along the line it has turned into a production, and by the time it happens, there is a lot of stress to make sure everything is perfect. As usual in life, some things are bound to go wrong, and if all the focus is on the details instead of just celebrating the joining of two people in love, then the real reason gets lost in the rubble.
 
Friends of son & wife - their daughter got married - they probably spent a half million on the wedding.
6 months later they got a divorce.

Last year the daughter got married again in Spain. We'll see how long this one lasts...lets see -
6 months for a half mil is how much a day...lol.
 


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