How to Create a Wedding Budget and Stick to It

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Making a budget is never fun. When the budget is as emotionally charged as a wedding budget, the difficulties can be daunting. Sticking to that budget until the reception is over can become a quite elusive goal. Since most wedding budgets are usually based more on fantasy than fact, a good dose of reality needs to be interjected from the start if success is to be achieved.

Almost every wedding that is large enough to merit a real budget has many of the same components. You need to talk to area florists about the cost of flowers and other decorations. The cost of wedding photographers can vary hundreds if not thousands of dollars. The packages offered can have wide differences, also. You need to verify the cost of various locations that can host your wedding and reception. Items like food, music, wedding planners, wedding cakes, bridal gowns, limousines, and tuxedo rentals need to be incorporated into your research.

If you are having a wedding with a large number of attendants, invariably some of them will have money issues when it comes to buying or renting their attire for your wedding. Since many of these people are close friends or relatives, excluding them for their weak financial position may not be an option. Bridesmaid dresses can cost hundreds apiece even in a modest wedding. The same is true for groomsmen apparel. With the need to cover these costs for several attendants, this can become a significant portion of your wedding budget.

Once you have assembled all of the cost estimates for the components of the wedding, it is time to sit down and evaluated what components will actually find their way into the festivities of the wedding day. Will you serve food or have a cake and punch reception? Can the reception have a band or will canned music work? The extravagance level of decorations, gowns, and flowers all must be agreed upon. The size of the guest list can be another budget breaker or limit your options for your wedding.

Older couples frequently must cover the entire cost of the wedding from their own funds. Young couples facing their first marriage may have funding from parents and grandparents to either extend their own resources or to cover the entire wedding cost. If family members have volunteered to cover the wedding cost, you may reach a point where their funds are not adequate. If so, you must decide if you are willing to subsidize your wedding and for how much.

This may sound a little petty to some. Most young couples do not have sufficient income to retire large wedding debt and establish a new home together comfortably. You are going to be married a long time if everything goes right. Big parties can be thrown at anniversaries later on when they are not so financially devastating. It may be better to delay the wedding a few months or a year than to absorb large amounts of unsecured debt at the beginning of your married life.

Everyone, including friends and future in-laws will have suggestions about items to be included in the wedding day activities. Be open to consider all suggestions, but do not always surrender the integrity of your budget to placate noisy people. A good budget is as much about saying no as it is about squeezing everything into the wedding and lesser costs. Be willing to step away from the budget now and again until emotions can settle and rational thought can rule the budget efforts.

You may have to adjust your budget upward, but do not let this happen unless it is absolutely necessary. When possible only allow new items or upgrades that can have their cost offset by savings in other areas. If you find bargains and are under budget, you can always include more in the wedding later.

If you find that there are many times that you are tempted to exceed your budgeted amounts, it probably means that you did not work hard enough or honestly during the budget building phase. You may need to sit down and take a better look at your budget with your mate before going much farther in the process.