Wedding Budget: The Main Mistakes

Draw­ing up a wed­ding bud­get is an impor­tant, if not the most pleas­ant step in wed­ding prepa­ra­tion. If you pay lit­tle atten­tion to it, you can have time to spend all the mon­ey with­out pay­ing for the most nec­es­sary pur­chas­es and ser­vices. So that you do not get into such a sit­u­a­tion, we have pre­pared for you a list of typ­i­cal mis­takes in the finan­cial plan­ning of a wed­ding. Fol­low advice from Chan­fash­ion and may your mon­ey always be under con­trol.

Spend without a plan

Mon­ey loves to count, espe­cial­ly when plan­ning such a large-scale hol­i­day. Before you start spend­ing your wed­ding bud­get, you need to plan it. Of course, in the process of prepa­ra­tion there will be adjust­ments and changes in plans, but you need to des­ig­nate a list of expens­es and the amount of mon­ey, at least in gen­er­al terms.

For­tu­nate­ly, in a hur­ry to help you Bud­get Plan­ner by Chan­fash­ion! We have cre­at­ed the most con­ve­nient tool, thanks to which all your finances will be in per­fect order: you can clear­ly see what your bud­get is and how much you can still spend, what amounts and to whom you paid as a deposit or paid in full. No more fran­tic search­es for checks and clar­i­fi­ca­tions about whether a deposit has been made 🙂

Don’t save

We are not call­ing for turn­ing into a miser and orga­niz­ing psy­cho­log­i­cal bat­tles for dis­counts, but why not save the bud­get where pos­si­ble?

First, crit­i­cal­ly review guest list. A ban­quet is one of the most volu­mi­nous bud­get items, and every guest who was invit­ed only because “it’s nec­es­sary” will cost you a pret­ty pen­ny. Are you ready to buy a dress cheap­er to call col­leagues from anoth­er branch or a long-for­got­ten fifth cousin? 🙂 Always think about which of the guests you and your fiancé real­ly want to see on your big day.

Sec­ond, think about the time of year. A beau­ti­ful wed­ding can be orga­nized not only in the sum­mer. More­over, in win­ter and autumn, it will also turn out to be much cheap­er with­out unnec­es­sary infringe­ment. wed­ding spe­cial­ists free on most dates, restau­rants and venues reduce prices due to the off-sea­son, and even wed­ding dress­es get on sale — sol­id plus­es if you don’t get into the wave of New Year’s cor­po­rate par­ties 🙂

Third­ly, feel free to ask about dis­counts. Per­haps the make­up artist will offer a dis­count on make­up to girl­friends or mom, and the pho­tog­ra­ph­er will reduce the price of a pho­to book when order­ing a full day of shoot­ing. The key is to ask, not demand.

Save too much

Yes, yes, you should not get car­ried away with sav­ings: both qual­i­ty and bud­get may suf­fer. It sounds like a para­dox, but now we will explain every­thing 🙂

The pur­suit of a low price can unex­pect­ed­ly turn into addi­tion­al expens­es. For exam­ple, you decide to save mon­ey and choose place for a ban­quet cheap­er. The first obvi­ous minus: most like­ly, there are some short­com­ings in a cheap­er place — for exam­ple, a small park­ing lot, tired repairs, insuf­fi­cient equip­ment. In the short term, the vic­to­ry is yours, the mon­ey is saved. But in the long run, you will have to increase the decor bud­get to make the hall look beau­ti­ful, and rent addi­tion­al tech­ni­cal equip­ment so that the restau­rant does not let you down at a crit­i­cal moment.

Before hap­pi­ly grab­bing at a cheap­er option, we advise you to weigh the pros and cons and cal­cu­late what addi­tion­al expens­es such sav­ings will incur.

misallocate money

Order­ing a star pre­sen­ter, exot­ic flow­ers and dri­ving a rent­ed Lam­borgh­i­ni to the restau­rant “At Aunt Glasha’s”, because only the rest of the mon­ey was enough for him is not the most rea­son­able approach to spend­ing, agree 🙂

To avoid run­ning out of mon­ey before pay­ing for the most impor­tant things, we advise you to take the time to pri­or­i­tize. Write down all the points of wed­ding expens­es: from rent­ing a restau­rant to seat­ing cards. And after that, num­ber them in order of impor­tance — let the first num­ber be the most manda­to­ry and impor­tant item on which you do not want to save, and then every­thing goes in descend­ing order. When you’re done, take a crit­i­cal look at the very bot­tom of the list: what can be delet­ed from this com­plete­ly or spent on it on a resid­ual basis?

Then, in the process of prepa­ra­tion, peri­od­i­cal­ly look into this hier­ar­chy and check: are you cur­rent­ly order­ing expen­sive hand­made invi­ta­tions, com­plete­ly for­get­ting about the design of an out­door cer­e­mo­ny, which has a high­er pri­or­i­ty?

Forget about the little things

Eh, if the wed­ding bud­get con­sist­ed of only a ban­quet, a pho­tog­ra­ph­er and a wed­ding dress, every­thing would be much eas­i­er 🙂 Dur­ing the prepa­ra­tion, many small pur­chas­es and expens­es can occur. A big mis­take is not to include them in the bud­get. Of course, tips for wait­ers or make­up for your mom and your fiancé on your wed­ding day may seem cheap com­pared to the big expens­es for a restau­rant or an out­door cer­e­mo­ny. But believe me, these lit­tle things can form a huge snow­ball that will hurt the bud­get.

Be sure to write down every small wed­ding expense and set aside at least 5–7% of the bud­get for small pur­chas­es.

Now you know the most impor­tant things about plan­ning a wed­ding bud­get. Get start­ed with our prac­tice Bud­get Plan­ner and keep your spend­ing under con­trol 🙂