$$$--where to get it & how to save?!

[courtney_b00]

I am just at the beginning stages--figuring out where to have things, decided where to book, etc. and I am just freaking out over how much everything is going to costs. I just don't know how I can possibly do it....I'm sure it'll all work out in the end but right now I'm just in a mood where it all feels impossible. Is there any good advice for saving money---I'm sure a lot of the DIY things can save money....I just need to win the lottery I think lol!

[Vikki]

Here's a couple things we did:

 

Do you use a monthly expenses budget? It doesn't have to be really formal but if you sit down and list out what you spend money on and how much you need sometimes you can squeeze out some extra savings. We put one together and realized we were spending almost $300 a month on eating out, latte's, the bar on weekends ect!!! So now we try to plan ahead for lunches and snacks. We still go out a little bit but we were able to put that money somewhere else. We also shop weekly with specific recipies in mind and buy only what we need then pick up the fruits/veggies as we go. That put our grocery budget down by about $150 a month. It's another $400+ to save!

 

Get a savings account at another bank and use your current bank's bill pay system to send money to it. Anytime you have an extra little bit just schedule a bill pay and forget about it. Just make sure at some point you match up the deposit records. Not having that savings where you can get to it helps more than you think.

 

Hope that helps!

[Jacilynda]

We did just what vikki did. For example we spent around $45 a week on just coffee. So we cut back and so instead of having coffee 4 or 5 times a week each we went to 1 or 2 times a week.

 

Although we have a lot of struggles right now w/ money do to a big issue waiting on late payments for a company i've been doing lab samples for we managed to do quite well. You don't have to spend alot to have a really nice wedding. We're have 35 people and have spent less than $6000 on our wedding which includes our attire, welcome dinner, etc.

 

DIY is a good way to start but watch what you're doing. Some things may require more tools than what you have and you may end up spending more doing it yourself just getting everything than purchasing something already put together.

 

here is a thread that covers some of this! http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t33804

[AnnaBanana]

One thing I am learning quickly is:

Choose a day other than Saturday. My gosh, the place I'm looking at charges almost $2k more for room rental on a Saturday than on a Thursday. If you're going to be away for a week anyway, why not do it on a Thursday?

 

 

As far as saving money goes - I am terrible at this. In order to help do this, we have set up a savings account specifically for the wedding and automatically set our paychecks to directly deposit a certain amount each time we are paid.

 

Cut out unnecessary purchases. Make budgeted shopping lists and stick to them.

 

Don't get carried away with wedding stuff! Buy one or two magazines to satisfy that urge, but remember that most of the magazines have websites.

 

Fight the need to run out and buy a bunch of things just because they are on sale. If it is not something you needed before it was on sale, you still don't need it even now that it is. (I'm bad with this - it's an awesome excuse to spend money)

 

Good luck!

[Vonnie6]

i am in a similar boat. i sat down, have a feeling for what type of wedding i want and how formal i wanted it to be etc. and look up on the cost of the type of dresses i wanted, hotel packages, and other bits and bobs and add them together. print a budget sheet from sites like confetti.co.uk or similar wedding sites and add it all up- oh and add 5% to the total to take into account of inflation. some hotels do free weddings like dreams. have the ceremony and get the whole party to go and eat together in the same restaurant that night. if you want to make it a bit personal, go to ebay or just browse on the internet for good deals. i got 25 chair sashes, 4 overlays and 25 napkins in the colour i wanted for $60! if the hotel allow candles, a few ona table makes the difference and you can get a bag of tealights (100 for £5 or 60 for £3) if the hotel allows candles. simple touches like that make so much difference! maybe not wear a 'big' wedding dress or maybe get a white bridesmaid dress instead.

[Donie Jordan]

Setting a monthly budget absolutely works! Fortunately, we are in no rush to be married, so once we got a good idea of the cost of the wedding we sat down and figured out how much we could put away each month. If you really put your mind to it you'll be amazed at how much you can save by bringing your lunch to work, only going out a few times a month, etc. Based on the amount we could save monthly, we decided on the wedding date. Coming out of this with no debt is an absolute must for us, so waiting a while longer for the wedding was really no big deal. Also, another tip is to not carry cash with you. Putting a $3 coffee on a credit card seems ridiculous to me, so if I don't have the cash I don't get it!

[jk1101]

Definitely agree with the other girls that looking at what you're spending your money on helps a lot. Cutting out buying coffee, breakfast and lunch has saved a ton for us. We've also cut back on going out to dinner since FI is a good cook and that saves a lot too. We have a specific amount of money that we direct deposit into savings every month, and then whatever extra we have I deposit as well.

[*Lo*]

We are having a relatively long engagement...so we have been spreading costs out over time. So we put a deposit for the photographer in Feb, I put a deposit for my dress back in the fall, and we're about to do the deposit for the room block now. That way it's not like we're paying everything all at once! Plus the deposit for the room block gets applied to our stay and it will actually cover the cost of our accomodations. So we're paying that now. So by the time our wedding comes we wont' be writing a cheque for $20K or anything like that.

 

It seems to work for us anyway.

 

Having money go automatically into a savings account each month does help as well!

[Cassondra2009]

FI and I both direct deposit money into a savings account from each paycheck and don't touch the account unless its to buy wedding things. We have actually saved quite a bit of money this way...its the out of sight, out of mind theory. I highly recommend it!

[EDSROSA]

Cutting back on daily purchases helps big time! We also opened up an account with ING Direct. Since its a online bank we really do not see the $ and in a year we were able to save $5,000.00! We would put any extra $ we had in that account. We also have piggy banks that we put our change in it everyday.