Reply to How much $$ are the Grooms parents expected to contribute to wedding costs?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote] Very few weddings are $250k, even in UMC DMV circles. I don’t believe you.[/quote]

I assure you that you are wrong. Since last September I attended (or know bride or groom’s family for) four. My DD is in two in the next year. Many, many weddings in the DMV are $250k or more.  Ask any local wedding planner, or stop by any of the local country clubs or luxury hotels.[/quote]

[b]Honest question: How are parents able to afford to pay $250k for a wedding and still offer a couple hundred thousand for a down payment for a home?  (Especially after paying $400k for college). Maybe folks make more money than I realize?[/b] [/quote]

Indian-American parent here.   This is the tale of several generations of educated parents who helped their offsprings by saving modest amounts of money and pooling resources so that every subsequent generation did better than before.

- Grandparents paid for the college of our parents and their wedding. They took care of their own retirement. Families lived in joint-families, so there was no pressure to build new homes. People lived in their ancestral homes and just kept building extra rooms when someone got married. Food came from the fields so people were able to subsist well. There was no concept of assisted living or daycares. The old and the very young were looked after by the whole family.

- My parents and ILs paid for our college and our wedding. They also lived in a self-sufficient manner in Govt jobs,  with their pensions, some generational wealth and investments.  Both my dad and my FIL - also educated several younger siblings and nieces and nephews. They paid for college and they got their siblings married as well as nieces and nephews married. So there was a sense of responsibility that the rising tide will raise all boats.

- DH and I, immigrated to US for high paying STEM careers. We did not have student debt and did not pay for our wedding.  We started saving for our retirement, kid's college, wedding of kids (even before the kids were born) from our first paychecks.

- We lived below our means. There were significant savings because of these few things  - no student debt, lowest mortgage on SFH, no childcare cost (I became SAHM after DC2), no eldercare or monetary help given to parents or siblings, no private schools,  minimal college costs since kids went to public flagship on $$$$ merit.  No, we did not pay 400K for our kids college.

- Our kids do not have student debt, wedding cost, car costs, cost of setting up first home, down payment for home.  They have been investing money since their first year in college. Over the years, relatives and friends have given them cash for  all occasions. The combined amount was given to them when they went to college as seed money to invest.  Their unused 529 was converted to their Roth, all internship money was put for retirement and investments. They are welcome to live with us for free so that they can rapidly build a nest egg.

- In short, they have to learn to pay themselves and their future children first from their first  paycheck.  This kind of discipline and awareness also hopefully makes them attracted to  people similar to them - those who can delay gratification, are family oriented, can plan for the future and work hard.

[/quote]

Whenever Indian immigrants tell their stories all I can think about is caste system.  [/quote]

Whenever Americans tell their stories I can only think of their parents having affairs and divorcing each other.  After that it is just sordid details of various kinds of neglect and abuse in the family. [/quote]

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