Wedding Savings Plan
If the bride and groom are paying for any part of their wedding, they need to set up a wedding savings plan as soon as they are engaged.
In our case, we started saving before he proposed! We set up a wedding savings account at the bank a few months before Tyler bought the ring and proposed. The banker asked, of course, when we got engaged. Imagine the look of shock on her face when I wryly told her that we actually weren’t engaged yet! I could tell she felt sorry for me with my false hopes of engagement, but that wasn’t the case. Tyler and I are conscious of our money and are pretty logical. For him, having a savings account before the engagement was another form of commitment to each other.
Here are the steps we took to set up our wedding savings plan:
- Decide how much you (the bride and groom) are willing to pay for the wedding. Our parents are helping us, but they are certainly not paying for a $20,000 wedding!
- Research and read about the cost of different types of weddings. My friend gave me the book, How to Have a Fabulous Wedding for $10,000 or Less. This book gives details and insight on having a beautiful wedding within a $10,000 budget. We decided to shoot for $10,000 savings, but want to spend significantly less than that on the actual wedding.
- Don’t forget the honeymoon! If you are paying for your honeymoon, it’s smart to save as soon as you are engaged for this as well. How much is the average cost of a honeymoon? RealSizeBride estimates the average cost of a honeymoon is $4,466.
- Crunch some numbers. How much can you realistically save each month? To financially decide when you are ready to have the wedding, do this simple formula: (estimated cost of your wedding) / (how much you can save each month) = (number of months to save for your wedding). For example, if you want a $10,000 wedding (out of your pocket) and you can save $1,000/month, the equation is: $10,000/$1,000 = 10 months. If you are engaged in December, then you will have $10,000 by October.
An amazing marriage will be a lot easier if you start without debt from your wedding.
Comment below if you have any questions or suggestions!
Related articles
- The Dos and Don’ts of Saving on Wedding Costs (community.ally.com)
- Wedding Budgeting 101: Where Is Your Money Going? (Blog.WeddingCrowd.com)
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