When should the grooms parents chip in on a wedding?

[Anonymous]

I say each pay 1/3. Who started this BS that the brides family pays for the entire thing anyway?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I say each pay 1/3. Who started this BS that the brides family pays for the entire thing anyway?

1/3 would translate to 50K per party. A typical Indian wedding costs $150K.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We happily paid for three weddings for our three daughters, which ranged in cost from around $40k to $100k depending on what they wanted. We didn’t ask or expect the grooms’ families to pay for anything, but accepted whatever they offered to contribute. While none actually contribute to the wedding costs themselves, they did things like hood very, very nice rehearsal dinners - one probably cost as much as many weddings! - gave the newlyweds large cash gifts, etc.

All of the brides were in their mid to late 20s on their wedding days.

How many of the divorces are you willing to pay for?

Wow are you bitter.

All three are quite happily married to this day. Sorry to disappoint.

[Anonymous]

How outdated and presumptuous of people who think a bride’s family should pay for the wedding. Women are no longer a financial burden… why on earth should the bride’s family be responsible for the wedding cost?

If a family wants to allocate a certain amount of $$ to the wedding, then fine. Otherwise, couple can get married at a wedding that they find.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who started this BS that the brides family pays for the entire thing anyway?

This^.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I say each pay 1/3. Who started this BS that the brides family pays for the entire thing anyway?

1/3 would translate to 50K per party. A typical Indian wedding costs $150K.

Who says any wedding has to cost this much? Break bad traditions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gender roles are so antiquated. Each side pays equally.

Yes and also break free of bad traditions. Have a small inexpensive fun wedding to suit couple's budget, accept what either side of parents can contribute but don't demand.

Parents think its a matter of their honor for kids to have fancy wedding and invite whole community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I say each pay 1/3. Who started this BS that the brides family pays for the entire thing anyway?

1/3 would translate to 50K per party. A typical Indian wedding costs $150K.

That's insane! I'm so glad my kids would shun something so ostentatious. Then again, my kids stopped having big birthday parties because they didn't like being the center of attention.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If the brides parents are paying at least $30K, anything above that is on the couple. $30K is a average wedding budget.

Some wedding dresses are $10K, that's not much.

LOL. Only fools pay that much coin on a dress. In todays day and age, no couple should expect anyone to pay for their wedding except themselves. Have the wedding you can afford. Cut the cord, kids.

No one in the younger generations thinks this way. I was stunned that my nanny who lived paycheck to paycheck with her dh spent 4x on her wedding than I did . She also had a Tiffany engagement ring. She and her dh put a lot of that on credit cards. She was pregnant when she worked for us and her baby shower registry was insane. I remember her ordering with gift money an infant bikini with sunglasses. Dh and I are professionals with good salaries. The majority of my kid's baby clothes were used. Bikinis/sunglasses were never considered.

[Anonymous]

Please don't do it afterwards. DH and I married at 25 and couldn't afford much. His parents gave us money after the wedding (like 1k) but it would have been so amazing before since we had to pay all our vendors 30 days in advance. It's cool, we were just a bit broke that month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Please don't do it afterwards. DH and I married at 25 and couldn't afford much. His parents gave us money after the wedding (like 1k) but it would have been so amazing before since we had to pay all our vendors 30 days in advance. It's cool, we were just a bit broke that month.

Probably they knew you would spend more if they gave it earlier. If you didn't have money, why there were vendors? Why not a simple exchange of wows and dinner in backyard or a restaurant?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We had an expensive small wedding - we spent basically the whole budget on the food and drink, venue, band. We had around 70 people but it was an actual outstanding meal with a competent chef and good wine. We didn’t have to do any of it but we wanted to have a really fun party with our closest friends. I hope no one attended with all the negative Nelly “weddings are such a big waste of money” stuff.

Getting together with your friends all in one place isn’t a waste of money. I’d do that before buying a nicer car or spending more on a kitchen upgrade.

We only have a certain amount of time on earth and having the sort of experience we had is worth every penny.

We paid for it ourselves, but could have asked for parental help. I’d gladly help pay for my kids to have a similar sized event. I’d be less thrilled about a 300 person cattle call.

Oh, the irony!

Not ironic - it’s about the size not the cost. You can feed 300 people for 10 bucks a pop, churches do it all the time. These huge sized weddings are impersonal and it’s not the waste of money, it’s the loss of focus that I don’t appreciate.

[Anonymous]

The only people that should be paying for the wedding is the BRIDE and the GROOM. It is their marriage. They pay for what they can afford as a couple, together.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't do it afterwards. DH and I married at 25 and couldn't afford much. His parents gave us money after the wedding (like 1k) but it would have been so amazing before since we had to pay all our vendors 30 days in advance. It's cool, we were just a bit broke that month.

Probably they knew you would spend more if they gave it earlier. If you didn't have money, why there were vendors? Why not a simple exchange of wows and dinner in backyard or a restaurant?

We wanted a wedding with our families present. We paid cash. It was 27k, so it was simple. It was the best day of our lives. Inlaws said they'd pay for the rehearsal dinner, but wouldn't give us money. We planned a very simple rehearsal dinner that we could afford since we didn't know if they'd pay. We wouldn't have spent more on our wedding, but we did have a lot of out of town guests upset they couldn't be invited to the rehearsal dinner.

The main issue was that our car broke down right before the wedding which used up any spare cash we had.

My whole point was that if you're a parent who says they'll pay, pay ahead of time so that it's less financial strain.

[Anonymous]

No rules.

Parents on both sides determine what they can afford and what they feel comfortable contributing and gift that amount to the bride and groom. The bride and groom then plan for the wedding they want. If they can do so with the gifted amount, great. If they can't, they can contribute their own money to make up the difference. Neither parents should feel obligated to pay for more than they are comfortable with, unless they are making demands for things to be included in the wedding. If that's the case, those parents should contribute additional funds to pay for whatever they are demanding.