Holy crap! Just listening to the radio and they mentioned the AVERAGE cost of a wedding in NYC was 31K.
I know I’m a poor, cheap ass, tight wad, so my wedding doesn’t count. I think we spent WELLLLL under 5K for our wedding. I just can’t imagine spending that kinda cash on a wedding. Well unless 31K to you is not hard to swing.
Anyway how much did you spend and was it worth it?
~Matt
$18K in Dallas in 1999, and believe me, that’s CHEAP in Dallas, where some of the fancy wedding top the hundreds of thousands. Could have spent a lot less by having the reception in a less elegant setting, but we had the money and wanted the atmosphere.
Would I do it again for a second marriage (God forbid)? Nope. If I could go back and do it differently, would I? Nope. Worth every penny. Married a week before Christmas, 1999, and both the church and the reception were decorated for the holidays. Beautiful. Saved a ton on decorations and flowers, too because of it, or we’d have easily topped $20K. Worth every penny.
$92.00 Little White Chapel Las Vegas 11 Aug 90
.
$25K on #1 (ex’s parents & grandparents picked up another $10K I think), $8K on #2. #2 was far more enjoyable and I was able to put $20K more down on the house we ended up buying 6 mo later.
Holy crap! Just listening to the radio and they mentioned the AVERAGE cost of a wedding in NYC was 31K.
I know I’m a poor, cheap ass, tight wad, so my wedding doesn’t count. I think we spent WELLLLL under 5K for our wedding. I just can’t imagine spending that kinda cash on a wedding. Well unless 31K to you is not hard to swing.
Anyway how much did you spend and was it worth it?
~Matt
$0, New Jersey 1996. My father-in-law put up $15,000, though. A great time, although I didn’t need the 3 mile limo ride to the reception.
Probably less than $700 out of my pocket counting ring, flowers, and priest. Used a USMC base chapel (free), wore my dress blues (no tux rental), in-laws paid for the dinner, wife bought her dress, friend took the pictures.
I’m married 26 years and 4 months. Best investment I ever made. OK–the pictures weren’t very good.
My theory is that the more expensive the wedding, the shorter and unhappier the marriage. Most of these big weddings are for the mother-in-law to “get the wedding she never got.” Just look how happy Jennifer Wilbanks already was with her wedding.
Not a dime. Isn’t that what father in laws are for?
Are we counting the reception? Because according to the “rules” the groom’s parents are supposed to pay for that.
PS: I’m not married, so for me it is $0.
Less than $200. Justice of the Peace in Kingsville, TX was about $25 (had to wait until afternoon to get married, JOP was a used car salesman in town - his sales pitch “Come See the Judge!”), dinner at La Palacio was about $25 w/ margaritas, hotel in Corpus Christi about $100, rings were about $50 from Service Merchandise. Next day she headed to Guam via training in San Diego, and I headed to Pearl via training in Florida. Spread that $200 over 17 (going on 18) years, and I’d say we got off cheap.
Are we counting the reception? Because according to the “rules” the groom’s parents are supposed to pay for that.
PS: I’m not married, so for me it is $0.
I thought the groom’s family paid for the rehearsal and the bride’s did the rest
The bride’s parents generally pay for the reception. The groom’s generally pay for the rehearsal dinner.
I see a lot of flaws in your theory.
Very correct, I was confused.
jhc beat you too it, but again, I stand corrected.
There will be no rehearsal dinner if I ever sucker a girl into marrying me 
Justice of the Peace. Whatever a marriage liscense costs, and parking downtown. No ring, no dinner, no pictures, no nothing. We’re both real cheap, and our kid was allready 4 years old, so didn’t see much point in a real wedding. Kid is almost 17 and we’re still happily married.
First wife was from an ethnic Italian family in which weddings (and funerals) are great big deals. Don’t know what it cost because her parents paid for it but it was large with about 250 distant Italian relatives and friends on her side that my wife didn’t really know that well and about twenty from my side. Not that it did a lot of good. We’re divorced.
The most expensive wedding I attended was around $65,000. The brides parents were very well off and always liked putting on a big show, especially when one of their kids got married. The marriage lasted about three years.
My parents had a very simple Justice of the Peace type wedding during WWII. They had known each other all of three months before the war ended. My dad was in the RCAF flying a Spitfire and mom was British and in the WREN’s. My father was being sent back to Canada in a few days and asked my mother if she would marry him. They were both 20 yrs old at the time.
They’ll be celebrating their 60th anniversay in December.
Are you saying that there is a direct correlation between marriage costs and divorce rates?
Where did I say that Brian?
But what i will say is that having an expensive wedding is no guarantee of a happy marraige.
By the tone of your post as well as others it is insuated that because your ex’s parents were Italian, brought 250 family member to the wedding and reportedly paid alot that it may have contributed to the demise of the marriage.
People cause marriages to fail…not weddings.
I wholeheartedly agree that having an expensive wedding doesn’t guarantee the success of a marriage. Nor does one that costs $0.
"By the tone of your post as well as others it is insuated that because your ex’s parents were Italian, brought 250 family member to the wedding and reportedly paid alot that it may have contributed to the demise of the marriage. "
Will you f*cking stop insinuating or reading what you think into my posts. Or are you just trolling again?
I was using that as an example that big weddings are more important to some people than others. In this case my ex’s wife’s parents were from a culture in which big weddings are considered very important. If it had just been our choice and we paid for it ourselves, we would have made it a much smaller wedding with just immediate family and friends.
Not that it’s any of your business, but my ex wife’s parents had nothing to do with our divorce. That was strictly between my ex and I. In fact they were wonderful in laws in many ways. Unfortunately they are both dead now. My ex wife was the one that had some family issues but that is not at all uncommon with the first generation born here being in conflict with parents values imported from the old country.