Gender roles are so antiquated. Each side pays equally.

I think marriage is important milestone for a young person, I wouldn't mind helping if they are good for each other. My help would depend on my resources but obviously not throwing a $500K event for a celebrity style fairytale.

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!

Well, just different priorities with limited resources. You can share good times with friends in a new car and a fun kitchen as well.

If groom's or bride's parents have money to spend then it would be nice to pitch but neither side is obligated to do so. Wedding can be done frugally, parents who want or approve of unnecessary expenses for extravagance, can help, doesn't matter if they are groom's parents or bride's or just wealthy grandparents or childless aunt or uncle. Weddings are fun, lots of people get carried away.

My parents live in a 7M Potomac home with a 30M net worth and they wanted to throw a 400K wedding for their son (me) and my former fiance at the time. It was all about them showing off their wealth and my former fiance jumped at the opportunity. I am glad that I called off the wedding and broke up with my fiance because I wanted no part of it. I met someone else the following year and we had the wedding at the courthouse, just the two of us and my sister. My wife was, and still is, my sister BFF at the time I met her. I brought my wife to meet my parents and told them that we were already married so there would not be any wedding. My mother was not too happy with that but I told my mother that I did not want a big lavish wedding with my parents money. I said to my mother that she should give that money to the Red Cross. I would not want to marry any woman who wants a big lavish wedding.

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!

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.

What about when people from different cultures marry?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:there are new rules. the groom's family is now expected to contribute more than in the past. not all grooms' families know or subscribe to this.

That's only because everyone now subscribes to the idea that you need to have an elaborate and extravagant wedding PARTY that you can't afford.

I think it is now a law and not a rule. It passed the house and senate and was signed in to law. The wedding industry has a very strong lobbying arm. That equal pay and all that.

Anonymous wrote:there are new rules. the groom's family is now expected to contribute more than in the past. not all grooms' families know or subscribe to this.

That's only because everyone now subscribes to the idea that you need to have an elaborate and extravagant wedding PARTY that you can't afford.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they can’t even pay for the wedding themselves, they are not ready to get married.

+1

It’s so outdated to expect parents to pay for a wedding. People aren’t getting married at 18 anymore.

We paid for 12 years of private school, including boarding schools for our kids. Four years of college. One grad school so far. We are paying precisely $0 for any wedding that they have (irrespective of gender) which they have all known. I think weddings are a huge waste of money frankly. We will definitely give them a cash gift when they marry, then can do what they wish with that, but I hope they choose not to spend it on one day.

+1
This is us too! My job is to prepare them to be adults who can take care of themselves. Once they are done with school, they are off my books!!! And I don't believe they should marry while in school (university and grad school included). I will give a large cash gift. They can blow it all on a wedding or use it for a down payment, or blow it all on fancy cars (I would judge the latter, but not out loud to them); it's none of my business what they do with my gift. Oh, and I have all girls.

As PP stated I paid for 15 (big 3- including prek and primary) of private school, undergrad, and grad school (one in law other in medicine, third undecided). I'm not paying for a wedding!

They will get a trust at 37 (but they don't know this) when it no longer impacts their ambition or lifestyle.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Divorce rate should make people spend less on weddings but sadly we live in an era of social media so weddings are actually becoming more expensive. My BIL spent $30K just on fresh floral decor.

That is so asinine. I've never been to a wedding and thought to myself, "well, this would have been a great wedding except there weren't giant centerpieces and huge floral displays down the aisle".

(I bought 200 white roses from a wholesaler and put them in mason jars...less than $300 total. Can't imagine anyone had less of a good time because of it.)

People should do what they can afford and what makes them happy. For some 30K is nothing, for others its 10x what they will spend on their wedding

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.

You are very wealthy most are not.

And if you cannot afford it, you are not obligated to pay that much for a wedding.
But if you can afford it, why wouldn't' you?

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.

You are very wealthy most are not.

Not sure if PP is wealthy or just stupid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are no rules. If the groom's family is the typical DCUM demographic of having an astronomical HHI and anticipating a huge inheritance then they should help pay for the wedding.

They should? Why?

DP but that kind of family usually has a 50 person mandatory guest list so they can cough up the money.