Savings or pay as you go?

Me: savings. Him: none. Used tax return, pay as you go. My husband suggested a longer engagement to save more money (to spend on the wedding). But, I said unless he was willing to take over the hardcore planning details, I needed an endpoint. We kept as is.

My husband and I had a long conversation once we got engaged about how we were planning to pay for our wedding. We ended up opening a shared bank account, where we both deposit some money from each paycheck, and we used the shared account to cover most of our wedding expenses. Some expenses we each covered separately, but almost all of the larger payments came from our shared account. Neither one of us wanted to take on debt for our wedding, and we wanted to figure out how to pay for it without taking large amounts from our individual savings accounts, so this was the solution that worked best for us.

We did some of both. We're both lucky enough to have high paying jobs so it wasn't a huge stretch but I personally know my shopping habits so I set aside money each month in a separate account for my own portion of the payments and then transferred it out yesterday so that I can start final payments next week. But like our payments for the venue on a quarterly basis have just been pay as you go, same with all the deposits and dress and alterations and such.

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Whew, these are some hard money conversations and surely a process. We're married now, but still working on transparency of our wants and teamwork for our needs and wants.

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Yeah, Caitlin, your day is almost here! All your planning and investment can finally be enjoyed with your partner and friends.

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I'm so ready. Its definitely gotten stressful recently but I'm still sure its going to be worth it in the end!!!

We’re doing a little of both, in part because we established our first budget when we first got engaged in fall 2021, and since then prices have gone up several times. So we’ve had to regroup a few times now. We finally have our major vendors locked in, so fingers crossed there are no more surprises.

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Hi Kimberly. Price adjustments and regrouping are definitely real hazards in a longer engagement. It's interesting, no matter how much a couple plans there will inevitably be some changes whether it's inflation, change to employment, or vendors going out of business. And this is all outside of "people drama". Hope none of the above happens to you. It's your Year! Best wishes.

View Quoted Comment Thanks! It’s been a little frustrating, but we’re very fortunate that we both have good stable jobs, and FH bought a house right before meeting me. So if we have to spend more or cut deeper into our savings than initially planned, we’re not facing g the “house vs wedding” dilemma and only setting smaller life goals back. It’s more that I’m like dang I wish he had proposed a year sooner so we could’ve had last year’s prices. 😂

When we booked our vendors, our big discussions were always whether we could either afford to pay for the whole thing up front or, if they had monthly pay structures, whether we could fit it into our monthly expenses. We didn't necessarily set a line-item/ lump sum dollar amount budget, but we did make sure the expense was something we could cover either right away or by the time the wedding rolled around.

View Quoted Comment To understand your process, did you have an overall budget range (worked for me)? Or rather no max budget at all and you took each vendor on a case by case basis? If the latter, I'm thinking you took priority vendors first, then whatever didn't fit financially at the end were tossed?


We all have different approaches to paying for our weddings, so it's quite fascinating and valuable to share diverse and successful experiences.

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I've seen that show on Netflix! The Nashville couples often choose wedding over house. But, later we learn they decide to build a new house. I daydream of this level of affordability.

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We used a case-by-case basis. I used to work in the wedding industry and did a fair amount of research on prices in our area, so I had a decent idea of what things would cost, and we tried to make smart financial decisions from there. Our reception venue was an all-inclusive, so being able to estimate what individual vendors would cost vs having it all covered on one bill was really insightful, and we saved a ton of money that way vs using a blank-slate venue. A lot of the companies we worked with also wore more than one hat (ex. one company did photography AND videography, the company we booked for coordination also did floral & décor, etc.), so we could prioritize whichever things were more important but also knock other things off the list and have them covered. We saved a bunch that way plus avoided a lot of the COVID wedding vendor hunger games.

We paid as we went using cash payments or credit cards which we pay off monthly. By the time our day was here all was paid in full with no outstanding debt.

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Speaking of credit cards, my vendors required cash or check. NY business owners did not want to pay the 4% swipe charge. Did you experience similar? I would have liked to get points from using a cc, but I limited decorative things for less stress. One thing not paid off by wedding date was the gift from my groom, picked by me! Yeah, that needed cc installments.

View Quoted Comment No I did not run into that. But totally understand their logic. I’m in Los Angeles many of our vendors used Venmo and Zelle. How exciting your grooms gift what did you buy him? I have a funny story about the grooms gift. I bought my husband, which I lost a day before the wedding and had to go out and buy another one the day before oddly I ended up finding it when we moved recently.

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Oh yes, I meant to include Venmo and Zelle as I think it's a cash transfer only, right? I bought my groom an interchangeable Ferragamo belt for future use as he had his wedding accessories already chosen. I gifted him a watch for our first anniversary, the same maker as one of your gifts. Oh my gosh, I can't believe you lost and it's now re-found. The watch industry will gladly resell limited editions for you.

View Quoted Comment Woman after my own heart. I contemplated a Ferragamo belt. But ended up getting a Tag Huer Monaco Watch which I had to buy again the day before. I decided to keep the one I found for myself so now we are Monaco twins. 😂