The Big Picture: Budget

There are three currencies you’ll utilize when planning and paying for a wedding. They are dollars, your time and energy, and the time and energy of other people. In general, the less you pay in dollars, the more you pay with your own time and energy, and/or the time and energy of other people. Each wedding’s “balanced budget” will look different, and the most important thing is finding a balance that works for you.

Thinking about your own time and energy, and the time and energy of other people, as a limited resource (just like cash) will help you “budget” these resources appropriately. 

In order to set a realistic cash budget, you should do a little investigating into the costs of weddings in your area. A wedding can happen with any budget, of course, but knowing the general costs will keep you from the disappointment of, say, deciding that your budget is $10k, and then finding out that $10k might not get you what you actually want. 

If you've never planned a wedding before, you may have no idea what different things cost. Similarly, you may be in a position where your budget is just "as low as possible". It's funny how this "easy" first step of setting a budget basically makes you halfway plan the whole damn wedding just to get to a number, but you will be more likely to have an accurate budget if you do a bit of digging into costs first.

The budget sheet I created has an estimate for each line item. Depending on your needs and your area of the country, you may find a vendor at a lower or higher price point. For example, I find that finding an affordable, quality wedding photographer can be harder in the Seattle area, but there are plenty of affordable, quality food options. You might be somewhere where affordable venues are limited, but there are more options for wholesale or affordable flowers. And of course, no matter what the wedding industrial complex says, you absolutely do not need every line item on the budget sheet.

My husband and I drove away from our wedding in a rented U-Haul van, and shockingly, the world continued to turn. So, don't be afraid to nix the items that aren't important to you.