$20,000 budget wedding! I don't know what to prioritize. Help!!

It depends on where you live and how many guests you plan to invite. Have you nailed down your guest list?

If this is your budget, food and alcohol need to be your biggest priority.

Make a tentative guest list and see how many people you need. That helps to narrow down venue choices.

As a former guest at dozens of weddings, please prioritize guest hosting and comfort.

There are budgeting tools (maybe even the one of this site - I'm not sure) that if you put in your budget - it will give you a break down of what should cost what

First, for a lot of people, $20,000 is a huge budget. A lot of it depends on where you are...my sisters' weddings were $3000 and $7000 each. Our budget is significantly higher, but we're having a totally different kind of wedding. You may have to adjust some plans, but you can have a remarkable wedding on $20,000.

You'll get a lot of the same responses on here. Priorities first: Budget (which you have), guest list, then venue. If you don't have your guest list set, you shouldn't be looking at venues. Then, get creative. Think about what you really want out of your venue (for example, we wanted all-inclusive, so we made sure to look at those; my sisters both had their weddings at the church we grew up in for sentimental reasons).

Take a deep breath. You can do it!

I live in SoCal. My guests are estimated 100-130. My mom also told me to prioritize the food. But I'm still kinda freaking out. I will try the budgeting tool on this site. I think I have seen one.

I'll take a deep breath. I think I am overthinking everything all at the same time. Thanks!

Our budget is basically the same as yours. When we toured venues we tried to the get the most for our $. Our pp charge is 102 I think and we don't have to do anything except show up and party forever and have a 5 hour open bar. We then budgeted for paper products like invites, favors, flowers, photog. It's doable. Start touring venues. That'll give you an idea based on your tentative guest list

OP, where in So Cal? How many guests are you looking at?

What's included in the packages you've seen so far?

I have posted this so many times in the past week. But this breakdown really helped my when I first started budgeting. I adjusted based on what my specific needs/wants are, but it follow this generally.

https://publications.weddingwire.com/i/272806-springbook-2014/90

I'm planning a wedding in Santa Barbara. Don't know which part of SoCal you're in, but I know it can be discouraging. Couldn't do much with 20k in the area I chose, but to keep to my budget, I had to really go through my guest list and see who I really wanted there. 20k is a lot, don't get me wrong. But in this state, it's hard! I would start touring venues as soon as you can. You don't necessarily have to go with one that's all inclusive. It might be easier, but not always cheaper. If the per person cost is high with a caterer, try to cut your guest list. Food, venue, and alcohol should take up around 50% of your budget, I believe (no expert but I've read up on a lot of this). Anyway, I'm sure you'll find something wonderful

I rented a cheap banquet hall that I can bring my own food, so a licensed caterer is going to cook, bring waitstaff and bartender and cutlery. That leaves u with so much room for other stuff with that budget

Kathleen I live on the Central Coast, $20k for about 100 people sounds about right. You can look at all exclusive venues. A lot of the venues in my area seemed very expensive. You can ALWAYS cut your guest list. But make sure you look at what is included in each venue and make sure you can budget for catered food and alcohol. Getting started was very overwhelming for me as well. Hang in there!