Nowadays, Who pays for the wedding? What are the basic rules?

[Dancing Fire]

...1/3 bride's side, 1/3 groom's side and 1/3 newlyweds?. That's what my DD #1 said...

 

[Ally T]

We paid for our own, which was 12 years ago yesterday. My mother bought my dress, which is tradition here for the bride's parents to do, and my father in law paid for the food & drink as his gift, which turned out to be just over £5,000 & saved us a fair few pennies!

 

[missy]

I don't think there are rules these days. Depends on many things. Bride and Groom's age and have they been living on their own?

Lots of couples pay for their own weddings now and the parents can chip in some portion. It varies depending on the couple and their and their family's personal situation.

My parents paid for our wedding and my dress too but that was a long time ago and thinking back on it we shouldn't have let them. They don't have a lot of money and we could/should have taken care of it ourselves. I wasn't really thinking about it too much in those days and we were in the middle of purchasing a home and doing 2 gut renovations at the time so we were short on money too but now I feel guilty letting them pay. They did insist on paying because I remember resisting at first but I gave in too easily now looking back. Greg's mom didn't pay for anything including the rehearsal dinner which if you follow tradition she could have covered that. Which was fine because she was under no obligation to pay for anything. No one owes anybody anything when it comes to weddings and who is paying. The only people who are responsible are the couple getting married. The only problem I had with Greg's mom during that time is that she tried dictating who we would invite to the rehearsal dinner but I squashed that. I said to Greg she's not paying for it so no way is she adding guests to our rehearsal dinner. I think that was fair. We didn't have a lot of money to spend due to the home purchase and the renos we were doing and adding guests to the rehearsal dinner when we were paying was not cool. IMO.

I am in the camp of don't spend what you don't have for something as optional as a "big" or expensive wedding. If you have the money great go for it if you want to but do not go into debt over a wedding. Not a great way (IMO) to start one's married life. A mortgage is the only debt I think is acceptable.

Of course YMMV and there is no one size fits all but I definitely do not think traditional rules apply the same way they once did and I think more brides and grooms are paying for their own weddings at least in part.

 

[missy]

We paid for our own, which was 12 years ago yesterday. My mother bought my dress, which is tradition here for the bride's parents to do, and my father in law paid for the food & drink as his gift, which turned out to be just over £5,000 & saved us a fair few pennies!

Happy Anniversary @Alex T !!!

 

[MaisOuiMadame]

...1/3 bride's side, 1/3 groom's side and 1/3 newlyweds?. That's what my DD #1 said...

That's how we did it. Our parents would have gone 50/50, we were prepared to pay 100%, so this just worked. This way I was cool with my in laws inviting tons of their friends (had been an issue for previous wedding ls in the family) but them basically paying for their own friends made it truly OK for me. I can see how paying 15 k for people one has never met before might be a source of conflict...


My grandma bought my dress.

 

[missy]

That's how we did it. Our parents would have gone 50/50, we were prepared to pay 100%, so this just worked. This way I was cool with my in laws inviting tons of their friends (had been an issue for previous wedding ) but them basically paying for their own friends made it truly OK for me. I can see how paying 15 k for people one has never met before might be a source of conflict...


My grandma bought my dress.

Yes I feel the same way. If you are paying you have the right to invite guests we wouldn't normally invite. It's only fair.
How wonderful your grandmother paid for your dress. What a lovely thing for her to do and what a sweet memory to cherish.

 

[MaisOuiMadame]

I don't think there are rules these days. Depends on many things. Bride and Groom's age and have they been living on their own?

Lots of couples pay for their own weddings now and the parents can chip in some portion. It varies depending on the couple and their and their family's personal situation.

My parents paid for our wedding and my dress too but that was a long time ago and thinking back on it we shouldn't have let them. They don't have a lot of money and we could/should have taken care of it ourselves. I wasn't really thinking about it too much in those days and we were in the middle of purchasing a home and doing 2 gut renovations at the time so we were short on money too but now I feel guilty letting them pay. They did insist on paying because I remember resisting at first but I gave in too easily now looking back. Greg's mom didn't pay for anything including the rehearsal dinner which if you follow tradition she could have covered that. Which was fine because she was under no obligation to pay for anything. No one owes anybody anything when it comes to weddings and who is paying. The only people who are responsible are the couple getting married. The only problem I had with Greg's mom during that time is that she tried dictating who we would invite to the rehearsal dinner but I squashed that. I said to Greg she's not paying for it so no way is she adding guests to our rehearsal dinner. I think that was fair. We didn't have a lot of money to spend due to the home purchase and the renos we were doing and adding guests to the rehearsal dinner when we were paying was not cool. IMO.

I am in the camp of don't spend what you don't have for something as optional as a "big" or expensive wedding. If you have the money great go for it if you want to but do not go into debt over a wedding. Not a great way (IMO) to start one's married life. A mortgage is the only debt I think is acceptable.

Of course YMMV and there is no one size fits all but I definitely do not think traditional rules apply the same way they once did and I think more brides and grooms are paying for their own weddings at least in part.

Posting at the same time. amen to all of this @missy

 

[Austina]

In the UK it used to be traditional that the brides family paid. When we got married, we had a very small wedding, which we paid for.

When our son gets married, he’ll be paying for the wedding, as his future in-laws are divorced and neither is in a position to contribute. We will be paying for a lovely honeymoon for them, mainly because he’ll be able to limit the numbers if he’s paying. Future DIL’s sister got married recently and it got out of hand with 300+ guests. Sorry, from his side there’ll be us and a max of about 6 others, so I’m not coughing up for nearly 300 people I don’t know to stuff their faces

 

[Gussie]

Ours was old school. My parents paid for the wedding, his paid for the rehearsal dinner.

 

[Dancing Fire]

Ours was old school. My parents paid for the wedding, his paid for the rehearsal dinner.

Nice to have rich parents ...

 

[telephone89]

I think the couple getting married should pay for it.
Having the brides family pay for a wedding is basically a dowry. Time to do away with having to pay to get rid of your daughter.

 

[Ally T]

Happy Anniversary @Alex T !!!

Thank you, gorgeous lady! We are only just back from holiday this weekend, but did manage to drag ourselves out for a quiet dinner last night. Will get around to replying to your email this week x

 

[msop04]

The new rules are: THERE ARE NO RULES.

 

[diamondseeker2006]

I agree that there are no rules. But for both of our daughters, we followed the traditional ones as they were young (25 and 23) and not already living with their fiances at the time of the weddings. We paid for wedding amd reception expenses and groom's parents paid for rehearsal dinner and gift toward honeymoon.

I 100% agree with never doing a wedding that involves loans. Have a wedding you can afford to pay for without going into debt whether parents or the engaged couple.

 

[Tekate]

in my case 1% her side, 65% his side (me and hubster) and 34% the couple. We paid for the rehearsal dinner too.

 

[Gussie]

Nice to have rich parents ...

Lol, not rich, just old school!

 

[missy]

Thank you, gorgeous lady! We are only just back from holiday this weekend, but did manage to drag ourselves out for a quiet dinner last night. Will get around to replying to your email this week x

Aww happy you had a romantic dinner for your anniversary. No rush on the email sweet Alex. Take your time.

 

[missy]

in my case 1% her side, 65% his side (me and hubster) and 34% the couple. We paid for the rehearsal dinner too.

LOL 1% on her side.
I have said it before Kate and I will say it again. You are a sweetheart and indeed Kate the Great.

 

[rocks]

No right or wrong. My parents pay. When my brother got married my parents were horrified to discover that my brother's in laws to be weren't paying for the wedding (though it didn't stop them from trying to make the decisions, being quite demanding when it came to the guest list, and acting like they were the hosts at the reception). My father handed my brother and his fiancé a checkbook and told them to do whatever they wanted to. It was smallish (120 people) for a weekend in New York City. Lovely. Oh....and we hosted the rehearsal dinner as well. My brother insisted that the cost of the wedding should not exceed what he was willing to pay for.

 

[Rose-gold-or-bust]

My husband and I paid for most of ours but my mother took care of all the flowers and my husbands family chipped in financially as needed. We only had a small wedding costing a total of $10-12k

 

[Tekate]

It was quite the clusterf--- but we got thru it, good thing John was mellow yellow writing checks everywhere. They are happy and as you know we have our grand girl so it all worked out. xoxo to you.

LOL 1% on her side.
I have said it before Kate and I will say it again. You are a sweetheart and indeed Kate the Great.

 

[luv2sparkle]

We paid for two weddings for one daughter. The first was more lavish than the second, but the second one was in Kauai. We might not have paid for the second except she married the son of our good friends and he had never been married. It was a whole lot of weird. But now we have two gorgeous grand babies so I am not complaining.

I think it is a bit different these days because people get married so much later. Not sure we will pay for any of our sons. They are all over 30.

 

[lyra]

We paid for our own wedding of 50 people and with small cash donations from our parents. My oldest daughter just got engaged Friday, to be married a year from now. We've specified what we can help with, but it'll be pretty much exactly like what we had to do. We prioritized education over saving for weddings, and our daughters knew this ahead of time. Plus we let them live at home until they are married, and that is their "inheritance". We are almost retired.

 

[angeljosephy]

In Chinese culture it was customary for the groom's parents to pay. However my DH's parents were not well-off and we paid for everything ourselves. My parents were slightly miffed because DH's parents not paying means that I'm "not marrying well", but oh well.

We enjoyed being able to say "we are paying for it so we get to decide" anyway!

 

[Dancing Fire]

In Chinese culture it was customary for the groom's parents to pay. However my DH's parents were not well-off and we paid for everything ourselves. My parents were slightly miffed because DH's parents not paying means that I'm "not marrying well", but oh well.

We enjoyed being able to say "we are paying for it so we get to decide" anyway!

...and we paid for our daughter's dinner banquet. How customary is that for Chinese?

 

[Daisys and Diamonds]

when Gary's then 30 year old daughter got married to her long term boyfriend and father of her baby 13 years ago Gary and his ex wife split the cost of the food between them
i think the bride and groom paid the rest
they were living in Australia but came home to have the wedding, it was at the groom's father's golf club

my sister had quite an expensive wedding for the day and my mother paid (our dad was saddly no longer with us as he died relativly young)
i live in a completly different world to my sister- id never seen such huge wheels of cheese ...and it is true at the end of the night i took one home !
the day after the wedding mum offered Gary the same anount of money for a house deposit for us but i was never sure what conditions came with the money regarding marrage - we are still not married

i kind of desided in my head at my age i should have been able to stand on my own two feet but having said that at the time we never did manage it and we wouldn't have a mortgage now without my inheritence

my parents were old fashoned and my dad would have wanted to pay
it was a lovelly wedding, a cocktail wedding but plentiful and beautiful food all night with tons of alcohol and a beautiful venue

but there was a lot of fighting and arguing leading up to the wedding with mum having tantrums getting her way
i just didn't want that for us

my sister is a professional seamstress who specialises in made to measure formal wear so she made her own dress (i wasn't asked to be a bridesmaid and mum sent me $600 to buy an outfit - my sister was very bossy regarding shoes)

i really like the idea of eloping or just going down to the registry office and splurging on flowers like Princess Di carried down the isle

 

[Arcadian]

our wedding was under 200 dollars. Heck I went back to work afterwards

 

[missy]

our wedding was under 200 dollars. Heck I went back to work afterwards

Haha us too. At least our "first" wedding where we unexpectedly eloped 3 months before the big planned event. And Greg went back to work afterwards. I had to go back to the apartment and wait for our furniture delivery as we had just moved in together into a new home the day prior.

We got married at Brooklyn Borough City Hall. It was super romantic and Greg bought me those plastic roses. I protested because it was $20 (that was a lot of money back then ) but he insisted. I have them still. And that wedding at City Hall cost way under $200 including the plastic bouquet.

 

[Arcadian]

Haha us too. At least our "first" wedding where we unexpectedly eloped 3 months before the big planned event. And Greg went back to work afterwards. I had to go back to the apartment and wait for our furniture delivery as we had just moved in together into a new home the day prior.

We got married at Brooklyn Borough City Hall. It was super romantic and Greg bought me those plastic roses. I protested because it was $20 (that was a lot of money back then ) but he insisted. I have them still. And that wedding at City Hall cost way under $200 including the plastic bouquet.

The one thing he asked was that I wear a dress (I really hate dresses) so I went to Filenes Basement and bought a dress that would not have been too out of place in an office environment but wasn't super officy either.

My co-workers were indeed shocked. Asked me all kinds of questions. What was the occasion, was it a funeral or a wedding, if my mom was in town...!!!! I love pants suits and wear them often with high heels (don't care love them) So I had the shoes, just...no dress. The dress is navy, white and grey from Diane Von Furstenburg, which at the time was ALWAYS at the basement. Matter of fact, I have an older DVF bag I still carry from time to time which gets tons of compliments. I wish I could remember how much I paid for it, I just recall it was under 100 dollars. Then we paid I relive it was 75 dollars

The dress was never worn to work again of course, though I've worn it a couple of times since as it fits and he still loves it. That was nearly 20 years ago, its amazing I kept it to be honest.

 

[MakingTheGrade]

I had a double wedding with DHs sister and her husband. Their parents had the bulk of the guest list since two of their kids were getting married and graciously paid for 99% of everything and hosted at their home. We all bought our own clothes. I booked a surprise band for the “rehearsal dinner”. And my brother in-laws family bought the cake. No rules indeed! Just the way I like it.