Wedding payments

We paid upfront for our Dj and photographer and florist to get all of it out of the way —- deposit down on venue — paid dress in full at purchase - slowly purchasing decor as we go —

We got a travel rewards credit card.We use it to pay and transfer money from our bank account into it immediately.that way, we can use our points for our honeymoon or wedding traveling costs.

View Quoted Comment Smart move!!!

When it comes to wedding planning, I’m a huge cheater. Haha I’m getting married next year, but I bought my dress last year using a payment plan. I figured if I bought it and my now fiancé wasn’t the one, then I would just wear it for whoever I get married too lol I say I’m a cheater because as far as other things go, my venue is providing: cakes, catering, florist, DJ, officiant, and wedding planner. With all of these included we just make a payment every 90 days. My fiancé and I were only liable for finding a photographer/videographer. Luckily I found a company that does both. I put the deposit down for them and will be on a payment plan with them as well. I think the best way about going about payment plans is making sure they don’t fall in the same month. Also no one in our family is helping us. My fiancé and I are paying for it all on our own. Good luck with planning!

I only paid deposits and saved. This made me feel a little more confident when we had to push back the wedding because we would only be out deposits. Luckily everyone moved with us with zero problems.

We figured out how much we could afford and save for, which originally led us to having something very small (as in courthouse and then immediate family and close friends over for drinks and food). However, our parents were very generous and offered money because they wanted us to have a more traditional wedding (which we wanted but knew we couldn't afford), so we split the budget of a traditional wedding 3 ways. Then, my husband and I looked for vendors that fit within the budget we had set. Most vendors required deposits and then payment on the day or deposit plus 2 payments.

It was intimidating paying so much for something but my husband and I just got side jobs and the money from that went to the wedding

I picked things up little by little and then also tried to put some aside to pay for things each week or month. Then I used my card for the points for things. Unless they gave a cash discount which few places do. If you want to frustrate yourself make a budget. But know that you will be stressed when you do because you will look prices and compromise things want. But have a goal you want to keep it around. My brother gave me advise that pictures worth paying a bit more for. No one remembers the plate or what they ate but the pictures you do. If you are lucky and able to find a place that all is included great
Debit if you have room get things little by little. When making contracts with venders new specific and spell everything out from set up clean up and what want done. Include things like natural disaster and acts of God. And anything can think of as well. I have also that if bartender puts out a tip jar I am taking it and the caterer that supply bartender lost all gratuity and tip that was included and even extra. I just feel it is tasteless and tacky.
There are always other benders so try a few out before deciding. When meeting have a notebook and anything think of rite down i have sections for each one.

We paid everything upfront. No need to go into debt for one day.

We paid deposits (usually 25-50% of total) with all our vendors in cash or we used our AMEX if the vendor didn’t charge a transaction fee. We paid most of the remaining a month before the wedding (when it was due).


Definitely made an excel sheet to track our spending. We still went over our initial budget.
Ask your vendors to see if you can split up your deposits. We did this because we had just bought a new car around the same time we were booking our vendors so we didn’t want it all hitting us the same month. Most were pretty flexible.
Final payments were brutal though— we ended up paying around $75-80k that final month... so I definitely recommend paying little by little leading up to the wedding as opposed to doing the lump sum payment in the end because it does give you sticker shock even when it’s what you’ve been expecting to pay.

We’re going to pay for venue upfront since that’s the most expensive and then everything else we’ll make payments on. We’ve been saving for this day so we just used what was in our savings. I’m going to use my credit cards for everything else to get points and cash back for the honeymoon.

I think finding a venue that had the catering included was a big deal for us since the food is usually one of the most expensive things. This way, we had our venue and catering sorted out, and then most other things could be considered things we want, but don't NEED. It made it less stressful for us to plan after locking down the venue. We've just made installments on payment. Also, for other less expensive things, we've received discounts for offering to pay deposits in cash, and then agreeing to pay the rest in cash when due.

We created a budget and a savings plan. We paid deposits and will have saved the balances by the due dates. This is making me feel better if for some reason we have to reschedule, postpone whatever due to the virus we would only be out our deposits.

I have an excel sheet with the different categories and sub-catergories. For each category (such as Catering) there is a sub-category (such as appetizers, dinner, cake/dessert, and alcohol). I did “research” on how much the average wedding costs and how much of our budget should be allocated to each category (the cost of the venue and catering are typically the 2 largest percentages). We came up with a budget we were comfortable with, used those percentages in the categories to determine a budget for each category (we have ceremony venue, reception catering, photography, entertainment, attire, decor, rehearsal dinner, wedding coordinator, travel (like our hotel room), paper goods (save the dates, invitations and stamps).


It was a lot easier to start reaching out to vendors when we had a number already planned out for each category. That allowed me to know when I could say “no” to someone who was way too expensive and keep us on budget. This was especially important because we are paying for the wedding ourselves!

We put down deposits on everything but the dress. The dress we got at David’s bridal and got their credit card so we put the dresses on that and paid that off monthly. For everything else it was just a deposit. The catering wanted another payment in March but they are an hour away from us so they said don’t worry about it and not that we might have to postpone anyway none of our vendors at this time are taking payments. Now everything is pushed till the about a month before the wedding now which is okay for us.

We are using a cash back credit card and paying that off to avoid interest. We put deposits down for hair & makeup, floral and the venue. Everything has to be paid a month prior to the wedding. Luckily our venue (our most expensive expense since it’s almost all inclusive) does monthly payments.

We started by sitting down and deciding the absolute highest amount of money we were willing to put into our wedding. And then we calculated how much we could realistically save between now and then. We then decided the style we wanted and just started plugging in all the things that were important to us until we reached our budget amount. We have paid for our venues and my dress and some of the decor upfront and then have just been buying the rest of the things as we go. We are about 4 1/2 months out and have the vast majority of things for our day with the exception of the food and alcohol. We are paying everything directly from our bank account, not using loans or credit cards as we have decided that we are not willing to go into debt over a party. That's not how we want to start our lives together.

We figured out how much was possible for us to save every month, then talked to our parents about how much they were giving. After that, we had a budget of $12,000 and just decided on vendors based on what we could afford.

We figured out how much we could each put into our joint account before our wedding day. That plus a cash gift from my mom was our initial budget.

We put deposits down and then made budgeted monthly payments.