How much did your wedding cost? (Page 3)

I got married in Tokyo. Neither one of our families could be there.

We paid about 2000 for everything. 3 years later, back in the states, my parents gave us a down payment on a house in leu of not paying for the wedding. 

IMO a much much better investment. 

We are still happily married 15 years later. :=)

My wedding cost about $18k back in 2005, including honeymoon, rings, rehersal dinner. I think there was 66 people. The in-laws paid for the lion's share, but I was on the hook for the traditional groom stuff, including $2K for the rehersal dinner (almost all of our guests were out-of-towners), limo, groom's gifts, part of the flowers, and $2.5k for honeymoon to Grand Cayman. 

I think the surprising part was that the all-inclusive reception was only about $4.5K of the total. It's all the little stuff. We had just the basic flowers, but they were still $1500. The photog package was about $2200. We are still married

I shot a wedding once so I can attest to how stressful, time consuming, and expensive it is. I know why they seemingly charge so much. First off, I spent about $650 on film, developing, prints, and the album, with the album being a big expense.  The shooting was stressful, making sure you are in the right spot at the right time, getting the best lighting, getting coverage of all the guests, having the right equipment, necessary backup equipment, making sure you didn't run out of film at the wrong time, etc. After the wedding, the work is far from finished. It is time consuming to sort, touch up photos, crop, print, arrange, and create the album. Everything is digital now, but that only makes a part of it easier. Equipment is still expensive: camera, backup camera, flash, tripod, computer software, memory cards, lighting equipment can easily run $5,000, if not more. Also digital equipment doesn't make everyone into an instantly good photographer: there is a lot to know of lighting and flash photography. So don't get Uncle Joe to take the wedding.  You could find yourself with an album full of backlight pictures and indoor shots that make the reception look like it was in a cave.

Ours was about $12,000 back in 2000. We had about 125 guests, and the biggest expense was the reception with food, wine/beer, and paying for the place. I totally splurged and spent $1,000 on my dress, which was WAY more than I wanted to, but I fell in love with the thing.

We had a lot of guests because we were graduating from college and moving away, and it was kind of like a big farewell bash for us. We had an awesome time and I don't regret it, but we joke a lot that if we got married again we'd get married on top of the mountain in Telluride, and only have people there who loved us enough to get there. Not to save money, just because that would be more "us" than a big bash. I would still buy the same dress

Still married 13 years later.

Between $22,000 and $25,000, in 2001. Big items were the place and catering (almost 2/3 of the total). All the rest  was the small things that add up.

For her dress, we went to one of the bridal shops, walked out. She didn't want the traditional white wedding dress. While we were walking around, I saw a store with a dress that looked Greek. Dragged my wife inside, met a nice young man who draped clothes over her in what seemed an Egyptian look, and it clicked. She still laughs that her bellybutton was exposed. From deciding to go thru with it till the marriage itself took 5 weeks, with us organizing and paying for it all ourselves. Which is great, since it allows you to politely tell all the "helpful" in-laws that their assistance was not needed, with no ill feeling that since they pay, they should have a say.

We actually had fun planning it, and giving all the vendors a hard time, and have continued to have fun since.

My parents paid for everything but my dress and our wedding album. They paid for the photographer, we just had to pay for whatever pics we wanted and the album ourselves. I really don't even know how much they spent, they never talked about it. 

I have 2 sisters and my parents did the same for all of us. One of my sisters got married 6 months after me. A nice wedding for us was really important to both my parents. My mom always tells the story of how she had to wash the dishes at her wedding and my Dad still gets all P.O'd about it.

My Dad splurged on the open bar, I'm not sure he realized how much my husbands friends can drink.

Married in 1996 and still going strong!

Such interesting stories people have!

Married on a yacht on Lake Tahoe in 2004. 46 guests + crew/cameras. It was a package: boat time+photographer+catering+cake. After an experience with my brother's wedding, I didn't want family or friends to HAVE to do anything that day except enjoy the experience. They boarded and we cruised to Emerald Bay for the ceremony. Then we had the reception on the way back. Beautiful weather and scenery (our pics are gorgeous). Guests loved it. 

Our families rented multi-bedroom houses for almost a week and made it a vacation. Our friends flew/drove in and stayed several days, some of them with our families. My family paid for most of wedding day, while DH's family paid for the rehearsal dinner. We didn't have a "honeymoon" til the next summer when we went to Hawaii.

I'm guessing the total for everything between $10-12k (boat package was around $6k). Our parents still watch the wedding dvd, so that right there is worth it

Add me to the Vegas wedding crew. My wife and I were living in Boston at the time, our parents, extended family and friends were all on the West coast at the time. We figured since most everyone would have to travel, might as well make it somewhere everyone can have fun.

Total wedding cost was around $15k (not including rings). Most/much of that was on food and drink (we had a short reception with no band... you're in Vegas, plenty of other places to entertain yourself).

I would not change a thing. Vegas was great, everything was taken care of, our friends had fun w/o feeling like they had to spend every moment with us, or on wedding duty and 10 years later, the only thing people still remember was how good the food was and how much wine was flowing. The entire thing, save for a dinner my parents had to meet the in-laws extended family was paid by us.

We had a great wedding, which was by far the best day of my life until last summer when our daughter was born.

It was outside overlooking the ocean, with a tent set up for the reception after. Total cost was probably around 10K but to be honest, we didnt really keep track. We had a pig roast for dinner, and made the rest of the food ourselves  (baked potatoes, coleslaw, buns, etc etc) My father in law set up all the audio equipment, and we had a little bit of an open mic night after dinner.

We felt like we did pretty good, comparing to many of our friends weddings.

Got married on a cruise:  $2,500, give or take a few hundred.   they take care of everything, all you do is show up dressed and pick out a few things menu-style (food, drink, music, etc).  you're limited on the number of guests (awesome!), and those that don't do the cruise all have to leave pretty quick.  it makes decision making about a billion times easier.  the thing i splurged on was the mexican waiter shirt i wore for the wedding, and banished ties from entering the room.  the wife settled on the very first dress she found when shopping for about a hundred bucks, and she looked like a million bucks.  she later wore that same dress to a halloween party with fake blood on it.  that's how she rolls.

if they weren’t our family, i'm confident that our relatives would have thought we were half alien for not getting married in a church like a good catholic couple should.  HA! i'm surprised i can even spell catholic.

it's partially frugal, partially that we just didn't care enough about having a wedding to spend lots of money on it.  we had barbecue catered.  we return to that restaurant regularly - heading there this saturday   and only had beer and wine, chintzy or not.  of course, there was no bar or staff...the keg was by the pool, help yourself.

Has anyone said still paying for it yet?????

No really the only thing I recall was $1200 for the photos and that was 1989 dollars

1992..Not sure but guessing about 4k and 3k of that was the rings. Simple church (shotgun) wedding just a few immediate family members. Had dinner at a restaurant the night before and after the wedding. My sister took the pictures for free. No music. A few flowers at the church and maybe at the restaurant following the wedding. My parents paid for everything.

edited to add forget we went on a 2k honeymoon to Puerto Rico after my son was born so that makes 6k I guess.

Husband free since 2006!!

Got you beat

$35:  License $15, Judge $20, Witnesses were a friend and my new sis-in-law.  

Still married 11.5 years later.

We got married in April. My second, his first.

We flew to St. John, got married on Trunk Bay, had a delicious dinner with 4 of our friends, and then spent our honeymoon there too. That part of the whole thing, including the dress, not including the rings, was probably about $5K? Maybe a bit more?

Then, we came home and had a party. A big, hotel, blowout, party. It was by far the best wedding party I've ever been to, and that's honestly not because it was mine. It was at the Renaissance Marriott in Schaumburg IL (just outside Chicago). Holy Hell did we have fun.

Negotiated everything, because we booked kind of late. Still that shindig (including photographer, photo booth, and DJ) cost about $18-20K?

We paid for everything out of our savings. Worth every last penny to see my 84 year old Mother on the dance floor dancing with the props from the photo booth.

The whole event was full of love and happiness and fun. I'd like to think it was a good representation of our relationship.

EDITED TO ADD: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND I wore my dress twice!

Is this yours??  I can't tell in the first pic if that looks like your avatar because it's a bit small.

Either way, super cool!

Mine cost me my freedom, self esteem, and any hope for a laison with Uma Thurman.  There was also a $10k bill afterwards.

Mine was 30 years ago and the FIL paid for the hall & caterer ($3000) we paid for the rest, maybe $3K.

Our 1st daughter was married 4 years ago, knowing that whatever we did for her we'd have to do for our 2nd daughter, so we contributed $28K.  We offered to give them that as a downpayment or nest egg, but they wanted the big day.  We also hosted a cookout the next day, as the day goes by way too fast and although the wedding was wonderful, the cookout was just as fun.  Also, they did save some money by having a Friday night wedding.

Our 2nd daughter is getting married this July, we gave them the same option of cash or wedding, they both chose wedding (well SHE chose wedding).  My wife loves the planning, hosting and party thing, so she may have swayed DD's vote.

The best thing about having the second wedding on the horizon, is that after college and everything, I'm done paying for major events and can start socking away more money for retirement..

Yep - it's mine & Tony's! 

I didn't want for this to be a judgmental thread, just curious on other people's experiences. Money is so personal, and we all prioritize how we spend it differently. No one's story is better or worse.