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Establishing a wedding budget

Deciding how much of your total wedding budget will be spent on each category of the wedding and reception. Because most brides and grooms are older than ever (first time brides and grooms are 24 and 26, respectively) and well-established in their own careers, 70 percent of all weddings today are paid entirely by the couple themselves. Gone are the days when most of the wedding's costs are borne entirely by the bride's parents (good news for her parents!)

I realize that, for most of you at least, the idea of setting up your budget first sounds like a pretty dull idea. After all, you've just become engaged and you're caught up in the romance of this lovely time of your life -- thoughts of engagement parties, bridal showers, wedding gowns, honeymoons and who you will ask to be in your wedding party. The last thing you feel like doing is sitting down with a notebook and a pen and figuring out how much money you'll have to spend, exactly where it will come from, and how it will be spent . . . right down to the last twenty-dollar bill!

Ah, but here's the kicker -- trust me on this one -- it is IMPERATIVE that you set up your budget BEFORE you start spending money. There are several reasons why.

First of all, whether your "wedding kitty" is $5,000 or $50,000, if you don't establish your budget BEFORE you start to spend, the wedding will plan YOU -- one decision will lead to another and before you know it the wedding will cost two or three times what you expected.

Next, those involved in the planning may tend to become anxious and at odds with each other because the planning is out of control.

And then, finally, unless the budget is established in advance and you've given some thought ahead of time to such things as theme, setting, number of guests, and so forth, decisions are often made impulsively which may result in a hodge-podge of disjointed parts or, even worse, another one of those plain vanilla "cookie-cutter" weddings that we've all grown to dread.

To give you an idea of what I mean, here is a typical scenario: the couple becomes engaged on a Saturday night and she wakes her parents at 2 a.m. to tell them the exciting news. Then, first thing Monday morning the bride's mother calls to book their country club for the reception and the following Saturday the bride and her mother go shopping for a wedding gown.

What's wrong with that, you ask? Well, first of all, by booking the club first, you may not realize until it's too late that you may be required to purchase THEIR wedding reception food off THEIR special wedding reception menu, including THEIR wedding cake and all THEIR wedding beverages. Also, you may be required to employ THEIR waiters, bartenders, cake cutters, security officer, parking valets, coat room attendant and clean-up crew. Because the wedding reception accounts for about fifty percent of the entire wedding budget, it is important to choose your site wisely, allowing you to provide your own food, drink, cake and workers or your own catering service, if that is your desire.

Also, by running out, charged with "wedding adrenalin," to choose your wedding gown before you've even decided on a theme or booked your ceremony site, you may make a similar mistake. For example, you may purchase a sleek, sexy, sophisticated gown that won't work at all with the Victorian wedding theme and setting you eventually decide upon.

See how it works? You need a plan! Before you write a single check, sit down and sketch out your overall plan, including how much money you will allot to each spending category.

Here is a VERY loose, general cost breakdown of the average $18,000 wedding:

The reason I say this is a VERY loose breakdown is because every wedding is different and there are no set rules. Many couples would prefer to spend less on the reception, for example, and use the savings for their honeymoon. Or the bride may fall in love with a $3,000 gown and squeeze that money out of the floral and music funds. It all depends on each couple's priorities.

If you're interested to know what brides and grooms are spending on every category of their weddings in the part of the country where you live, I would like to refer you to a comprehensive study I recently completed for Tribune Media Services for their "Matrimony Mambo" web series that issyndicated to newspapers around the country. Click up one of their syndicated sites, such as the Houston's Chronicle's site.

There you will find "Matrimony Mambo," a "step-by-step guide to getting the wedding you want with the money you have."

Once you've opened this web site, click up "Step 1 - Budgeting" where you will find my "Master Budget Planner" and my "Wedding Costs Around the Country." The latter will be very helpful to you because it gives the average expenditures for 27 wedding categories for the nine major regions of the United States, along with the average total costs of weddings in each region.

The "Master Budget Planner" will give you budget planning pages you can print out and use to keep track of your own budget, or you may want to build your own wedding budget notebook, which I explain in my book "How to Have a Big Wedding on a Small Budget" or, if you're not an organized self-starting type of person, you may want to pick up a copy of my "Big Wedding on a Small Budget Planner and Organizer" that has everything laid out for you -- all you have to do is fill in the blanks. The important thing is that you decide what you will spend for each category of the wedding and write it down SOMEWHERE!

Finally, here is my last word of advice when it comes to planning your wedding budget: remember, this is NOT your mother's wedding, or your aunt's or your best friend's wedding. You and your fiance have the right to spend the money any way you would like -- it's up to you -- it's YOUR wedding. Good luck and God bless!